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A LECTURE 



HISTORIC EVIDENCE OF THE AUTHORSHIP AND 

TRANSMISSION OF THE BOOKS OF 

THE NEW TESTAMENT, 

DELIVEBED BEFOBE THE 

PLYMOUTH YOUNG MEN'S CHRISTIAN ASSOCIATION, 
OCTOBEE 14, 1851. 

BY 

S. P. TREGELLES, LL.D. 



- Ita ut interrogate, cujus quisque liber sit, non heesitemus, quid respondere 
debeamus." — Augustimis, contra Faustum, 1. 33. 




LONDON: 

SAMUEL BAGSTER AND SONS, 

15, PATERNOSTER ROW. 



M.DCCC.LII. 



-£>' 






/ // 



la S 



I ANDREW ALEXANDER, ESQ., LL.D., 

PROFESSOR OF GREEK 
IN THE UNIVERSITY OF ST. ANDREWS, 

THE FOLLOWING LECTURE 

IS RESPECTFULLY AND GRATEFULLY INSCRIBED, 
BY HIS SINCERE FRIEND, 

THE AUTHOR, 



Plymouth, 

March IB, 1852. 



CONTENTS. 



INTRODUCTION „ . ix 

LECTURE 

Importance of the subject 1 

PROCESS OF PROOF 4 

St. Augustine's mode of investigation ..... 5 

Period of inquiry 7 

NEW TESTAMENT AS A COLLECTIVE VOLUME . 8 

Testimony of Eusebius, 264—330 8 

All our Books universally received except James, 2 Peter, 

2 & 3 John, Jude, and Revelation 9 

Discrimination occasioned by the Diocletian Persecution . 10 

Traditors 12 

Books received in the time of Origen, 185 — 254 ... 13 

Canon in Muratori 15 

Date of this Canon 17 

New Testament Books in general use in the time of contem- 
poraries of the Apostles 19 

ST. PAUL'S EPISTLES 21 

Proofs in the 2nd century; Canon in Muratori, Irenseus, 

Clement of Alexandria, Tertullian . . . . . 22 

Marcion 25 

Tertullian's appeal ......... 26 



VI CONTENTS. 

Page 

Testimony of Clement of Eome to 1 Corinthians, in 1st 

century 29 

Authority of that Epistle indirectly shown .... 31 

Clement's testimony to the Epistle to the Romans . . 32 

Polycarp's testimony to the Epistle to the Philippians . 32 

„ „ to 1 Timothy, Romans, 1 Corinthians, 

and Ephesians . , . 33 

THE FOUR GOSPELS 35 

Regarded as known in the 2nd century .... 35 

Testimony of Irenseus 36 

Not dependent on Papal authority. Irenseus and Victor 37 

Connection of Irenseus with the Apostolic age . . 38 

Justin Martyr's account of the Gospels as publicly read . 40 

Justin's Gospels not apocryphal writings .... 42 

Untenable theory as to myths 44, 45 

Proved facts not invalidated by lapse of time ... 46 

Testimony of John the Presbyter to Mark and Matthew . 48 

Sentences in Polycarp and Clement of Rome ... 49 

Connection of 1 Timothy v. 18, with Luke x. 7 . . . 50 

ACTS OF THE APOSTLES 52 

EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS 52 

Early use 53 

Authorship not authority in question 53 

Pauline in a general sense ....... 54 

CATHOLIC EPISTLES. 1 PETER 54 

1 JOHN 55 

BOOKS OPPOSED BY SOME. EPISTLE OF JAMES 56 

Origen, Clement, Syriac Version 56, 57 

2 PETER 58 

Addressed to Cappadocia ; testimony of Firmilianus . . 58 

Passage in Clement of Rome 59 



CONTENTS. • vil 

Pasre 
2 & 3 JOHN 60 

EPISTLE OF JTTDE 61 

APOCALYPSE . . 61 

Papias, Justin Martyr, Irenseus, Melito, Clement of Alexan- 

andria, Origen, Tertullian, and Hippolytus, as witnesses 61, 62 
Counter statements of Caius and Dionysius . . .62, 63 
Apocalypse rejected through opposition to Millenarianism 63 

RESULTS OF EVIDENCE 64 

Wide range of historic evidence 64, 65 

No difficulty in tracing back as far as from Eusebius to 

St. Paul 65 

St. Augustine's Canon fully met 65, 66 

Acts of Paul and Thecla, and similar books, why rejected 67 

No counter evidence 6S 

EVIDENCE FROM THE CHANNELS OF TRANSMIS- 
SION • 70 

Testimony from corporate custody 71 

Transmission by MSS. and Versions 73 

CLAIMS OF ROME 74 

Contradicted by the transmission of Scripture . . 76 

" The Church a Witness and Keeper of Holy Writ " . 76 

TRANSMISSION OF THE NEW TESTAMENT TO US. 

ENGLISH VERSIONS 77 

Anglo-Saxon Versions 77 

Wycliffe 78 

Endeavours to suppress his Version 80 

Tyndale 81 

Coverdale 82 

Accession of Queen Elizabeth (Nov. 17, 1558), free use of 

Scripture 83 



Vlll CONTENTS. 

Page 

ROME AS A KEEPER OF HOLY WRIT .... 83 

A keeper back of MSS 84 

A keeper back of vernacular Scripture . . . . ' . 85 

Respect shown to conscience at Rome .... 86 

Romish Sunday-schools 86 

Scriptures in Italian for sale at Rome 87 

Artifice of Romish Versions 88 

ROME AS A WITNESS OF HOLY WRIT ... 89 

" Go unto Joseph" 89 

"The Throne of Mary" 90 

Imposture not detected for want of Bibles .... 90 

Illustration of this 91 

USES OF SUCH INVESTIGATION . . . . . 92 

As meeting the claims of Rome 93 

As a guard against Rationalism 94 

Difficulties alike in Nature and in Revelation . . .95, 96 



APPENDIX: 

No. I. On the Text of the New Testament .... 

No. II. Some of the Results of the Genuineness of the New 

Testament 



INTRODUCTION. 



The object of the following Lecture is to present, in an 
intelligible and popular form, an accurate statement of 
the historic evidence which enables us to speak with cer- 
tainty as to the authorship of the books of the New 
Testament, and also to describe the channels through 
which they have been transmitted to us ; — these channels 
of transmission themselves bearing an important testi- 
mony to the books handed down. 

In the compass of a Lecture but an outline of some 
parts of the subject was possible ; I have, therefore, stated 
very briefly those points about which no question is 
raised ; and, thus, in such parts, I have rather pointed 
out the evidence than given it in detail : on those sub- 
jects, however, which are at all controverted, the evidence 
has been given with considerable minuteness. 

I have long w r ished, and intended, to write a full 
account of the historic evidence on this important sub- 
ject ; the materials for which have increased on my hands 
while engaged in biblical studies, connected with the text 
of the New Testament, on which I have been occupied 



X INTRODUCTION. 

for several years. I need not here detail the causes which 
have prevented the completion and publication of the 
volume of Historic Evidence, which I announced some 
years ago, as being in preparation ; I have only now to 
say, that this Lecture contains an outline of part of the 
subject, into the ivhole of which I may, perhaps, fully 
enter at a future time. 

My reasons for publishing this Lecture are identical 
with those which led me to deliver it : I wished to give 
a clear and sufficient answer to the inquiries, Why do you 
receive the New Testament books as genuine ? and, How 
have these ancient writings come down to our days r 
Professed scholars will see (if they should read the fol- 
lowing pages) that I have not sought to make myself 
intelligible to them exclusively : indeed, on biblical sub- 
jects, although there are many things which scholars only 
can investigate, yet the practical value of their investiga- 
tions all depends on their being intelligently communi- 
cated to general readers. I trust that it will not be 
thought that it is ever needful to sacrifice accuracy to 
this end. The historic evidence to the authorship of the 
New Testament books is a subject of common concern to 
all Christians. If attacks are made with a great show of 
learning and research, it is well for those who may meet 
with such popular attacks to be fore-armed. It is not the 
lot of every one to examine and search for himself through 
the mass of Christian literature for the first four centuries ; 
but there are few, indeed, who cannot apprehend the 
bearing of evidence when it is placed before them. The 
needful avocations of daily life will often render personal 
study and research impossible ; the daily discharge of 
daily duty has to be fulfilled conscientiously ; and it is to 
those who are thus engaged in the laborious occupations 



INTRODUCTION - . XI 

of the desk, the warehouse, or the shop, that I wish 
especially to address this statement of evidence. 

All men are not astronomers ; yet all can appreciate 
the results of mathematical knowledge when applied to 
astronomy ; just in the same way may the results of 
critical studies, applied to Scripture, be understood and 
used by readers in general. It is true that many may not 
even remember the names of the early witnesses to our 
New Testament books ; still, however, if they can grasp 
the facts of their evidence, they will carry away and re- 
tain those results which will be of great practical value 
when occasion should arise. 

On ordinary subjects there are many things to which 
we give credit, because we rely on the accuracy of our 
informant. Thus, even amongst men of some scientific 
knowledge, but few calculate an eclipse for themselves : 
they see that its occurrence is stated in the almanack, 
and that is enough : and as to persons in general, they 
believe that the eclipse will take place at such a day and 
hour, with perhaps hardly a thought how it can be pre- 
defined by astronomers. And so on most subjects : we 
trust the information which we receive, because we believe 
in the competency of our informant. But when questions 
are raised, then, indeed, there is often enough a desire to 
investigate the grounds on which the information rests ; 
we may frequently satisfy ourselves as to these, though 
we never could have traced them out for ourselves. 

Thus, as to this part of Christian evidence, I only ask 
for credit to be given me for bringing forward true testi- 
monies of persons who lived at the times mentioned ; — 
thus pointing out the steps of argument which others 
may easily follow. On this it may be remarked that the 
evidence of the witnesses is by no means weakened 
through the peculiar opinions which any of them held ; 



XU INTEODUCTION. 

and it is also well to notice that the paucity of the Chris- 
tian writings in the second century arises, in part, from so 
many ancient works having been lost : this loss of ancient 
writings causes such a contrast between the second cen- 
tury and the fourth. 

In saying that I do not now address myself to professed 
scholars, I wish it to be plainly understood that I do not 
avoid their scrutiny : they will find that all extracts from 
ancient writers have been fairly and sufficiently quoted, 
and that when mere references to passages have been 
made, places have always been pointed out which suffi- 
ciently prove the subject in hand. 1 * I mention this be- 
cause popular statements are sometimes opposed (most 
needlessly) to critical exactitude. On points of Christian 
evidence I have myself often felt how unsatisfactory it is 
to find, instead of a close and severe statement of what 
the testimony of a writer is, a loose assertion, " it cannot 
be doubted but that he used and quoted such or such a 
book." I never knew what value to attach to such re- 
marks, until I had the opportunity of examining for 
myself. 

Of course I claim no originality as to the passages 
brought forward ; they have all, I believe, been cited by 
others ; in every case, however, I have re-examined them ; 
and in drawing up the arguments based on them, I have 
followed in the track of others or not, as I found suitable. 

No apology is needed for endeavouring to popularise 
accurate statements on such subjects. Had I my choice, 
I would seek to address myself to the Christian people on 
points connected with Scripture, rather than to the in- 

* I suppose that no objection will be made to the citations being given only 
in a translated form ; I can assure the reader, be be friend or foe, that every 
quotation has been taken from the original source. 



INTEODUCTION. Xlll 

structed few ; because such matters are of equal or of 
greater concern to them ; and especially so in the present 
day, when endeavours are habitually made to circulate 
almost every possible statement which would invalidate 
the authority of Scripture. As things are so, it is the 
Christian people that ought especially to be considered on 
these subjects ; in illustration of this, an ancient saying 
occurs to my mind, " that it were as well not to have 
thought of that which is for the common good, if one did 
not know how to express it intelligibly to those whom it 
concerns." 

In the popular literature of the present day, how habi- 
tually do we find a laxity of thought and expression with 
regard to Scripture authority, or even a tacit assumption 
that modern research has disproved this as an antiquated 
superstition ! I do not now speak of the open and avowed 
attacks on Revelation. And then, again, there is often a 
tone of gentleness when errors on these fundamental 
points are mentioned; whereas, any distinct assertion of 
the authority of God's word is stigmatised as polemical 
intolerance. This may be found in publications which 
professedly avoid all mention of religious opinions. Thus, 
a popular review, conducted ostensibly on such principles, 
recently dismissed a work with only the following re- 
mark : " A thoughtful book on a great and difficult his- 
torical problem"; — this said "thoughtful book" being 
one of the most bitter and unseemly of modern attacks on 
revealed religion, intolerant and severe; and the "difficult 
historical problem" being just this, — whether the four 
Gospels are forgeries or not ! If avowedly neutral pub- 
lications, through oversight, admit what casts, by insinua- 
tion, such doubt on the objective facts of Revelation, what 
must be the tone of those which oppose it ? 



XIV INTKODUCTION". * 

And there are open opposers, — men who use all their 
influence, not only to negative the truths of revealed 
religion, by causing a rejection of the distinctive doctrine 
of Christianity, — redemption by the blood of the Son of 
God, — but who set themselves to disprove the records of 
our faith ; and when any defend those truths which they 
know to be of infinite preciousness to their own hearts, 
they stigmatise such with being actuated by sectarian 
bigotry and a narrow-minded repudiation of the highest 
results of modern philosophy. Then be it so ; let modern 
philosophy perish, so that the Cross of Christ be main- 
tained ; * let those who know the gospel of the grace of 
God, uphold it in all its preciousness, — remembering that 
the contradictions of man can never invalidate the truth 
of God. 

We are told, with regard to the publication of certain 
works, not a few of which are of doubtful or thoroughly 
sceptical character, — "Nothing could be more unworthy 
than the attempt to discourage, and indeed punish, such 
unselfish enterprise, by attaching a bad reputation for 
orthodoxy to everything connected with German philoso- 
phy and theology. This is especially unworthy in the 
'student' or the 'scholar' (to borrow Fichte's names) 
who should disdain to set themselves to the task of ex- 
citing, by their friction, a popular prejudice and clamour 
on matters on which the populace are no competent 
judges, and have indeed no judgment of their own; and 
who should feel, as men themselves devoted to thought, 



* Sometimes they accuse defenders of being actuated by "interested motives" ; 
be it so; — those who defend the title-deeds of their heavenly inheritance, the 
book of the Covenant which has been ratified by the blood of the Son of God, 
shed for the remission of sins, may well be "interested" in so doing; for here 
they have the record of that eternal life which God has given them in his Son. 
" Interested motives," such as these, have nothing in them at least of temporal 
policy. 



INTRODUCTION. XV 

that what makes a good book is not that it should gain its 
reader's acquiescence, but that it should multiply his 
mental experience." 

This, then, is modern liberalism. We are recom- 
mended to read books which in many ways run counter 
to every doctrine of Christian belief. We may pore over , 
all that has been written in opposition to the Godhead and 
sacrifice of Christ ; we may study the sceptical and 
pseudo-philosophic objections to the authority of Scrip- 
ture ; we may waste our hours over writings intended to 
disprove that there is a "personal" God; and all this is 
to be commended as increasing our mental experience; 
in truth it would increase it, even as our first parents 
obtained by transgression the knowledge of good and 
evil. " Be not deceived : evil communications corrupt 
good manners." However unworthy it may be of a 
Fichtian* "student" or " scholar" to object to the habi- 
tual use of poison for the mind, the Christian student of 
God's truth may rightly warn the popular mind (if he 
have ability so to do), especially as it is admitted that on 
this subject it possesses no judgment of its own.f We 

* The philosophy of Fichte is, I hope, but little known amongst those for 
whom these pages are especially designed. The attempts to popularise his sys- 
tem in an English garb have not been particularly successful. Dr. Davidson 
("Biblical Hermeneutics," p. 219) thus speaks of it — " The Fichtian philosophy, 
which was idealism, regarding all objective being as real only in our subjective 
ideas, and thus denying the existence of a Supreme Being, which Fichte re- 
solved into the notion of a subjective moral arrangement of the world, was not 
expressly made the foundation of any system of theology." Of course a Fich- 
tian, — a rejecter of all thoughts of our responsibility to God, — would approve 
of whatever would unsettle belief in actual Christianity. 

t What a solemn responsibility, then, do those incur who press on the atten- 
tion of a populace, devoid of competency of judgment, books which dogmatically 
teach the religion of negation ! What would be thought of the liberalism of any 
friends of "progress" who should say, " The people are no competent judges of 
what is wholesome in food ; it is, therefore, an unworthy act in any who excite a 
' popular prejudice 5 against us when we offer them well-flavoured poison" ? 

And as to what was said about " Ger m an philosophy and theology," in the 



XVI INTRODUCTION. 

have not to stigmatise any body of men, or the writers of 
any nation ; but, surely, if we are sincere in our belief in 
fundamental truth, we can do no other than show the real 
tendency of those writings, which are designed (even when 
many other things are introduced into them) to lead the 
mind away from the simple reception of the Revelation 
given to us in the Scripture. 

The mode in which many conduct their opposition to 
the truthfulness and authority of Scripture, has been thus 
described : — 

" Religion and metaphysics are now contemplated from 
within, and not from without ; the world has been absorbed 
in man. The opponents of Christian doctrine in the 
seventeenth and eighteenth centuries were generally men 
of reckless and abandoned impiety, while they now claim 
its blessings without a Church, affect its morality without 
a Covenant, assume the name of Christ without acknow- 
ledging a personal Saviour, and regard Christianity itself 
as a necessary truth, independent of any gospel-histories, 
and unsupported by any true redemption. They have 
abandoned the ' letter' to secure the 'spirit,' and in return 
for the mysteries of our faith, they offer us a law without 
types, a theocracy without prophecies, a Christianity 
without miracles ; — a cluster of definite wants, with no 
reality to supply them ; for the ' mythic ' theory, as if in 
bitter irony, concedes every craving which the gospel 
satisfies, and only accounts for the wide-spread ' delusion' 
by the intensity of man's need. Christian apologists have 
exhibited the influence of the same change ; they are 
naturally led to value exclusively those arguments which 

extract given above, it should be observed that the mo3t determinedly anti- 
Christian of the books thus commended to our attention, is of mere English 
origin. 



INTRODUCTION. XVU 

meet the exigencies of their own times ; and so it is now 
a common thing to depreciate the outward evidences of 
religion, which are not, however, the less important be- 
cause they are not conclusive to some minds. Historical 
proofs must necessarily claim attention, even where they 
cannot convince; and, as aforetime, many who did not 
believe for Jesus' words, believed for his very works' 
sake, so still the external array of Christian evidence may 
kindle the true inner faith, and in turn reflect its glory." 
— {Elements of the Gospel Harmony: by Brooke Foss 
Westcott, M.A., Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge : 
PP- 3, 4). 

Whatever be the tone of mind in the present day, no- 
thing surely can deprive historic proof of its value and 
force. Be it remembered, that its force depends not on 
the mental power of perception of those to whom it is 
addressed, but upon its own nature. If a man be in- 
capable of understanding a demonstrated theorem, the 
fault lies in his mind, and not in the nature of the proof 
itself. We must consider this, whenever we see men who 
are not convinced by the plain and distinct testimonies to 
the historic reality of the Christian revelation. Those 
who are proof against all conviction, seem to assume that 
it displays mental superiority ; if so, it is of the same kind 
as would be shown by one who would deny the conclusive- 
ness of a simple geometrical demonstration. Such a one 
might deem himself superior to common opinions ; what 
others would think of him is a somewhat different question. 

I do not undervalue the labours of Christian apologists 
who regard the subject (as it is attacked by many) from 
within. If there were in existence some ancient edifice of 
vast extent, presenting an untold variety of parts, some 
might say that it was the product of many ages, without 
definite plan, or unity of design. Others might look on it 



XV111 INTRODUCTION. 

with more intelligent eyes, and might perceive the mutual 
coherence and adaptation of the respective portions ; they 
might show that allegations of want of symmetry arose 
wholly from the partial and incorrect view taken by the 
objectors. They might thus prove that the common 
opinion was true, that it had proceeded from the mind of 
one skilful architect. But if there were records of the 
origin of the edifice, such as inscriptions on its various 
parts, which had always been well known, then it might 
be thought that the most direct proof would be to point an 
objector to these public monuments. He who took this 
line of evidence would by no means overlook the labours 
of those who proved the adaptation of the parts of the 
whole (a work which would probably require superior 
powers), but still he might feel that he took the more 
direct way of proving the point,* — a way, be it observed, 
which is not simply apologetic, but which puts the opposer 
on the defensive, instead of allowing him to hold a sup- 
posed vantage-ground in choosing for himself, how, when, 
and where to attack. 

I wish, if possible, to restore the historic grounds of 
Christian evidence to their proper place ; they are, I am 
persuaded, a citadel which will ever be found impregnable : 
it seems as if the enemies of Revelation have secret mis- 



* In this Lecture I have almost exclusively confined myself to the external 
parts of testimony ; the internal accordance has only been hinted at incidentally. 
Many points, therefore, in which the New Testament books exhibit their won- 
derful unity and coherence, have of course been passed by, as well as, in general, 
the sort of testimony which one book bears to another. The citation of St. 
Luke's Gospel in 1 Tim. has been brought forward, because it is direct, but not 
the mention of St. Paul's Epistles in 2 Pet., because it does not bear on certain 
specific epistles. 

The evidence derived from mutual coherence and relation of Scripture has 
great value for those who think, while historic proof addresses itself not to these 
only, but also to those who, from their avocations or their mental constitution, 
think but little,— whose attention needs to be aroused by a presentation of distinct 
facts, wholly irrespective of whether they think or not. 



INTRODUCTION. XIX 

givings as to this point : for they direct those attacks, which 
are intended to make an impression on the multitude, on 
any other point rather than this ; they casually describe it 
as of small importance, or else they pass it by as though 
they would ignore its very existence, and lead others to 
do the same. 

Thus, every conceivable subject which relates to the 
books of Scripture is made in turn the locality of the in- 
cursion of those rude forayers : their object being offensive, 
they choose their time, their place, and their weapons; 
and using a vigilance and an activity worthy of a better 
cause, they seek ever to put the upholders of truth merely 
on the defensive. It is, indeed, our duty " to contend 
earnestly for the faith once delivered to the saints " ; but 
we ought to occupy such a position as to be able so to 
uphold the external fabric of Revelation, that it may 
afford a well-known shelter against the onslaught of assail- 
ants, and that its historic reality may be so known that 
none may doubt, except those who are willingly ignorant. 

If it be objected by any that I set out from the assumed 
ground of belief, I answer, that objectors commonly, if not 
universally, assume the ground of negation of belief; how- 
ever, in the exposition of argument (as found in the follow- 
ing Lecture), I assume nothing on the peculiar subject of 
Christian evidence : I take there the simple ground, if the 
ordinary process of historical investigation be well founded, 
then it folloivs that the New Testame?it books are indeed 
genuine: the proof is then given, and all rests on the 
testimony of witnesses, and not on dogmatic assumption. 

It is a great mistake to suppose (as many now seem to 
do) that a negation of belief in Revelation marks mental 
elevation, or is an indication of a mind that thinks for 



XX INTRODUCTION. 

itself. Any one can thus acquire a kind of celebrity ; and 
not a few of those, whose writings and words are circulated 
amongst us, appear to maintain their negative opinions, 
simply to obtain a notoriety which they could gain in no 
other way. But few of these, however, seem to think for 
themselves at all. They adopt some notion from some 
leader, and thus, while they boast of being free from all 
trammels, they are really the superstitious admirers (might 
I not say adorers ?) of what they consider to be superior 
intellect or transcendant genius.* They profess to have 
taken a position of " progress," and they speak of the 
need that we have of some new declarer of truth. Some 
even expect such a thing : they anticipate the rise of some 
one who shall be (to use their own words) a true priest, a 
prophet, a godlike soul : to him they are evidently prepared 
to listen with ears of obedient credulity. The " mission" 
of such a one (to use a term which certain modern wri- 
ters apply so uncouthly to persons or things sent forth by 
no one) would be to arouse men to an apprehension of the 
unreality of all that has been credited as revealed truth, 
and to present instead such rationalistic apprehensions as 
shall fully extol and glorify the mere human intellect. 
Whatever opinions the reader may profess on the subject 
of the prophetic warnings of Scripture, at least he will, I 
think, see in these expectations, on the part of those who 
reject the Revelation given to us by Jesus Christ, that 
which calls his solemn words to mind, — " I am come in 
my Father's name, and ye receive me not : if another shall 
come in his own name, him ye will receive."' — (John iv. 43.) 

* And as to the leaders themselves, the mass of their objections and arguments 
are nothing but a repetition of refuted assertions, utterly devoid of originality, 
and marking no superiority of mind whatever : these leaders would not impose 
so easily on their followers, had they to do with persons tolerably well acquainted 
with what had been thought and written on the subject long ago, or with those 
who are not willing to be deceived. 



INTRODUCTION. XXI 

The Scripture tells us of " many antichrists," and also of 
" the antichrist," who shall " deny the Father and the 
Son." — (1 John ii. 18, 22.) Are not the rejecters of Him 
who once came in his Father's name, 'prepared to receive 
one, who is marked by the denial of all revealed truth ? 
Has not the Scripture warned us as to those that " received 
not the love of the truth that they might be saved," that 
" for this cause God shall send them strong delusion, that 
they should believe a lie " ? 

But what other can be expected, if men have before 
them the full extent of the evidence to the coming of the 
Messiah of God, and to his work of atonement, and yet cast 
it all aside as unworthy of acceptance, but that they should 
be allowed to follow the Messiah of their own hearts, and 
to receive the solemn and righteous judgment of Jesus 
Christ of Nazareth at his second appearing ? * 

* Since the above was written, I have noticed some observations on statements 
contained in Tennyson's poetry, which I transcribe. The passage to which 
reference is made is that in which he says, " Eing out a slowly-dying cause," 
and afterwards, " Ring in the Christ that is to be." These expressions seem 
plain enough, but I prefer not to comment on them in my own words, but in 
those of a reviewer. His remarks are : — 

" His ringing out of the old is intelligible enough, especially where he speaks 
of a ' slowly-dying cause ' (that, namely, of Christianity) ; but what and where, 
pray, are the ' nobler modes of life, the sweeter manners, purer laws ' ? Who 
is to bring the thousand years of peace ? And who, tell us, Tennyson, if you 
can, is the ' Christ that is to be' ? Of this one thing we are certain, you do not 
mean Jesus of Nazareth, or any one system or person retaining Him in his or 
its belief. 

" We ask Tennyson, as a thoughtful and gifted man, if he really thinks, on his 
principles, the millennium so near, as that he needs be awakening already the 

bells of its jubilee ? Is it literature or poesy that is to make men 

happy? Or is it philosophy which is to effect this mighty change ? — 

philosophy which, in its modern refined shapes, has substituted a dead idea for 
a living God and Father, shaken under man's feet the hope of immortality, 
sought with cold, firm hand to quench tbe only fire from heaven which has ever 
shone on our benighted way, and decreed solemnly, in its chilly and skeleton- 
surrounded halls, that Revelation is impossible We, on the other 

hand, hold to a more sure word of hope and promise. We expect new heavens 
and a new earth, in which dwelleth righteousness. We look for the help of man 
to a higher source than himself." — Critic, Feb. 2nd, 1S52. 



XX11 INTKODUCTION. 

These observations have been suggested wholly by the 
remarkable language of the objectors themselves, and the 
yearnings for the future which have occupied their hearts. 
Would that they might learn to be satisfied with Him who 
has already come, and that through faith in his name they 
might find a shelter from that solemn reality, " the wrath 
to come "! 

All adherence to belief in Revelation is stigmatised as 
opposition to " progress " and " free " inquiry : then let 
words be thus used ; things remain the same : — it is better 
to oppose all progress towards error, and utterly repudiated 
should be all free inquiry which sets out with the rejection 
of the authority of God. Such progress as some now talk 
of with regard to religious truth is that which they never 
would apply to any other subject. If the first step in pro- 
gress as to Revelation is to throw aside all that we know 
of the elementary law's of evidence as to facts, — then let 
us make progress in learning by rejecting letters, in natural 
philosophy by denying the law of gravitation, in geometry 
by repudiating definitions and axioms, in optics by denying 
the very existence of light, and in chemistry by rejecting 
the law of definite proportions. 

Let none suppose that I wish to put an acknowledgment 
of the facts of Revelation in too high a place, as though 
such a reception of Scripture and Christianity were in itself 
the object to be attained. Far from it : — just as the Law 
only brought condemnation on those who owned its claims 
but transgressed it, so the New Testament brings con- 
demnation on every man who owns it to be from God, and 
yet does not use its teaching as showing the way to God, 
through faith in Christ. But while this is the case, we 
may well ask, Which is the more likely to give heed to the 
light, — he who rejects it, shuts his eyes to it, and goes in 



INTRODUCTION. XXlll 

a contrary direction, or he who owns that it is really light, 
and that it marks the way in which his steps should go r 

Romanism, on the one hand, may own that Scripture is 
from God, and yet keep it from the eyes of men ; rational- 
ism, on the other, may deny the claims of Scripture 
altogether. Romanism may affirm that men cannot under- 
stand Scripture for themselves, and therefore may present 
to them doctrines which contradict it, and may also set up 
authority based on false assertions ; rationalism may de- 
clare that man possesses sufficient " intuitional conscious- 
ness " to teach him aright. In opposition to both these 
forms of error we may stand with the Scripture as our 
safeguard. We have not to show any favour to Rome 
because it opposes rationalism, nor are we to have any v / 
sympathy with rationalism because it rejects the demands \^ V 
of Rome. We may admit that spiritual illumination is - 

needed to understand Scripture aright, but that God gives 
this by the operation of his Spirit ; and so far from claim- 
ing any ability of our own, we may repudiate the posses- 
sion of any intuitive powers to guide us aright. The 
misuse or the misinterpretation of Scripture is no argu- 
ment for lessening its own value : it is a witness to the 
truths of God, even though its testimony may be often 
unheeded. A heart that is early taught the authority of 
Scripture, and that is instructed in what the Scripture says, 
is imbued with those objective truths which the Holy 
Ghost may use to teach their living power and efficacy as 
inwardly applied; while he who is taught to reject Scrip- 
ture has an especial barrier placed before him to exclude 
the light. 

This, then, is an answer to those who think that too 
much stress may be laid on the historic evidence to the 
Word of God as an external thing. Happy is he whom the 
Spirit of God leads to receive the testimony of Scripture 

<> III Corm-thtsns 2 ,' /4 






XXIV INTRODUCTION. 

into his heart, so that he may find eternal life, through the 
cross of Christ ; he knows the real preciousness of Scrip- 
ture ; but what can be thought of the twofold blindness 
of the condition of him who not only rejects the truths 
which bestow spiritual blessing, but who formally sets up 
some supposed philosophy, instead of that which authori- 
tatively declares those truths ? 

In 2 Tim. ch. ii., the value of holy Scripture is especially 
declared in connection with " perilous times " of the " last 
days," when " evil men and seducers shall wax worse and 
worse, deceiving and being deceived." In contrast to this, 
Timothy was reminded that he from a child had known 
the Holy Scriptures, which are able to make wise unto 
salvation, through faith which is in Christ Jesus. Thus 
we may learn what it is that has a protective power : we 
have the ivhole Scripture, of which there was but a part 
written when Timothy received his training ; and Scripture 
is the instrument by which God acts on the mind of a child 
that learns it ; the same Scripture makes wise unto salva- 
tion, through faith in that Saviour of whom it testifies ; 
and it is still the same Scripture which affords spiritual 
support and instruction to him who has received the gospel 
of Christ ; for by it " the man of God may be perfect, 
throughly furnished unto all good works." 



A LECTURE 



HISTORIC EVIDENCE OF THE AUTHORSHIP AND 

TRANSMISSION OF THE BOOKS OF 

THE NEW TESTAMENT. 



In speaking of the historic evidence of the authorship 
and transmission of the books of the New Testament, 
I propose, first, to bring before your attention those 
proofs which are conclusive on the subject of their 
having really been written by the Apostles and their 
companions, and then, to point out briefly the channels 
through which they have been transmitted to us. 

I need not dwell at length on the importance of the 
subject : it must be evident to all who value the 
revelation which God has given us in the New Testa- 
ment, that it is well for our minds to be informed as 
to the distinct grounds of evidence on which we believe 
and receive these writings as authentic. We hold 
Christianity as a divinely -communicated system of reli- 
gion, — a religion which is based on facts, and which 
sets forth doctrines connected with those facts: the 



2 HISTOEIC EVIDENCE. 

New Testament presents to us the record by which 
those facts have been made known to us, — hence the 
interest of this subject to the mind of every intelligent 
Christian. 

The ground- work of our religion is the fact that the 
Son of God, who was with the Father before all worlds, 
became man, and for our salvation, after He had in all 
things glorified God by a life of obedience, laid down 
his life upon the cross as a sacrifice for sinners, that 
He rose again from the dead, and that He ascended to 
the right hand of God the Father, after having com- 
manded repentance and remission of sins to be preached 
in his name amongst all nations, and having set forth 
" the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the 
Holy Ghost," as the object of our allegiance and re- 
ligious worship, whereunto we are baptized. 

This fact — the cross of Jesus Christ — is the ground 
and reason why there is such a thing as Christianity in 
the world : it is this which has delivered nations from 
the blindness and idolatry in which they were once 
sunk. And although the name of Christian is unhap- 
pily too often a mere profession, and although it is in 
many lands almost identified with false and evil super- 
stitions, hateful to God and hurtful to man, — yet still 
it is to this fact, brought to our souls by the life-giving 
power of the Holy Ghost, that any of us know the 
real blessing of peace with God, through a Saviour's 
blood. 



IMPORTANCE. 3 

It is thus, to those who really know the value of the 
gospel of Christ, that the subject before us is replete 
with interest ; for such only can enter into the true 
value of the Scriptures, since they are not only their 
instructor in the truth of God, but they are also the 
title-deeds of their heavenly inheritance. 

We may in a sense apply to this subject the words 
of St. Luke, in the introduction to his Gospel, " that 
thou mayest know the certainty of those things wherein 
thou hast been instructed;" for, thoroughly satisfied as 
we may be in our own minds of the full authority of the 
records of our religion, we cannot but feel that exact 
information as to the grounds of evidence has a peculiar 
value, when objections or difficulties are raised by any. 
Our own minds may be wholly unaffected by the ob- 
jections brought forward, — we may be as sure as ever 
we were that Scripture is the word of God, and yet 
we must feel that it is at least unsatisfactory to have 
questions raised which we do not know how to answer ; 
and this must be especially true in a case like the 
present, when the difficulties and objections may be so 
fully met, as to show that they arise either from the 
objector not being fully aware of the bearings of the 
subject, or else from a desire on his part to take ad- 
vantage of the ignorance of others. 

But there are also inquirers, — persons who really 
wish to know on what ground the Scriptures of the 
New Testament are received : now, if such inquirers 



4 HISTORIC EVIDENCE. 

are candid, they certainly ought to be met : — such 
persons ought to be shown that it is not a mere preva- 
lent opinion that Matthew and others bore testimony, 
in the books which bear their names, to the events of 
our Lord's life, death, and resurrection, but that we 
have the most simple and well-defined grounds of 
certainty that this is the unquestionable fact. 

We ought to know what to answer, when asked why 
we receive as authoritative the Acts of the Apostles, 
and reject the Acts of Paul and Thecla ; — why we own 
the Epistles of the New Testament, and reject the 
Epistles and Discourses attributed to St. Peter in the 
Clementine Homilies. The answer may be given as 
simply, clearly, and fully as if the question were, "Why 
do you acknowledge the first and second parts of " The 
Pilgrim's Progress" to be written by John Bunyan, 
and reject the third part as a spurious addition ? 

I have now to endeavour to present before you such 
a statement of the evidence on the subject as shall be 
both clear and ample : the details into which I must of 
necessity enter require a certain measure of attention, 
of the same kind as is needed in pursuing any other 
line of proof, whether mathematical or moral. 

PROCESS OF PROOF. 

How, then, can we know satisfactorily to whom we 
ought to ascribe the authorship of ancient works ? 



PEOCESS OF PEOOF. 5 

How can we prove that any "book was really written by 
the person whose name it bears ? How can we, living 
at this time, inquire with all confidence into points of 
authorship which relate to a period eighteen hundred 
years ago ? In other words, What is the process of 
proof which must be applied to this subject ? 

A very distinct statement of the mode of investigation 
is given by the Christian writer, St. Augustine, about 
the year 400. He lays down, plainly and unhesitatingly, 
that the authorship of Scripture must be investigated 
in just the same manner as we would inquire into that 
of secular writings. In the case of profane writers, he 
says, most truly, that it has often happened that works 
have been produced and attributed to their pens, which 
have afterwards been rightly rejected as spurious, — and 
why ? Because such alleged writings possess no ex- 
ternal evidence of their authenticity, not being men- 
tioned by contemporary and immediately subsequent 
authors ; and because they also, in their contents, 
present those things which are not in accordance with 
the author to which they have been ascribed, or to his 
known writings, or to the time in which he lived. 
This is a plain, discriminating canon of St. Augustine, 
for the rejection of supposititious writings. 

But as to authentic works, we have simply to apply 
the converse of this canon. St. Augustine asks how 
we can then determine such and such works to be the 
genuine productions of Hippocrates. He replies, — 



b HISTORIC EVIDENCE. 

" Because a successional series of writers, from the 
time of Hippocrates and onward to the present day, 
have declared them to be such ; so that to doubt would 
be to act the part of a madman. Whence (he con- 
tinues) do men know as to the writings of Plato, 
Aristotle, Cicero, Yarro, and other such authors, what 
is really theirs, but by the same continued testimony 
of successive ages ? " 

This principle he then applies to the point, with 
which I would now connect it : — 

" Many (he says) have written much on subjects 
relating to the Church, not indeed with canonical au- 
thority, but for purposes of aid or instruction. Whence 
does it stand as an admitted fact whose any work may 
be, unless it be by testimony from the author's time, 
and by the continued and wide-extended knowledge 
amongst those who come after, that these things have 
been transmitted to us, so that, when asked, we need 
not hesitate what we ought to answer ? " 

St. Augustine, in this passage, is addressing Faustus, 
the Manichsean, the first (it is said) who denied that 
the Gospels were really written by those whose names 
they bear. He then applies the argument to the con- 
troversy which he was at that very time carrying on 
with him. 

" Why should I go back to things long past ? Look 
at these very letters which we hold in our hands ; and 



PROCESS OF PROOF. 7 

if some while after we shall be dead, any should deny 
those to be Faustus's, or these to be mine, whence will 
he be convinced, except through those who now know 
these things, transmitting, by continued succession, 
their acquaintance with the facts to posterity?" — 
( Contra Faustum, 1. 33.) 

Now, these principles are of the utmost importance 
with regard to historic proof ; for although it might be 
objected that St. Augustine concedes too much to his 
opponent, in laying down that a genuine work ought 
of necessity to possess such successive testimonies, and 
although we know that many writings are received^ 
without doubt or hesitation, although the absolute evi- 
dence is but small in itself, yet this is certain, that no 
work can be spurious which is authenticated by such 
evidence as that which St. Augustine has described. 

Thus, if in the ages which immediately follow that 
in which a work is said to have been written, we have 
distinct statements from credible witnesses of its exist- 
ence and authorship, we possess that definite historic 
ground on which we receive the best authenticated 
productions of antiquity. 

The Xew Testament, we must remember, consists of 
a collection of books ; the statement of evidence must, 
therefore, relate in part to the collection as such, and 
in part to the several portions of which it is composed. 

The period of inquiry as to any work is of course 
limited to the ages immediately following that in which 



8 HISTOEIC EVIDENCE. 

the authors are said to have lived : we need not go 
below the fourth century as to the New Testament, for 
from that time our twenty-seven books have been all 
commonly received. 

THE NEW TESTAMENT AS A COLLECTIVE 
VOLUME. 

The first statement, then, to which I shall call your 
attention is the list which Eusebius gives of the twenty- 
seven books of the New Testament. 

This well-known ecclesiastical historian was born in 
Palestine about the year 264 : in his history, written 
about the year 330, he thus mentions the Scriptures of 
the New Testament : — 

" Now, this appears to be a suitable place to give a 
summary statement of the books of the New Testament, 
which I have already mentioned. In the first place, 
then, we must put the holy quaternion of the Gospels : 
these are followed by the Acts of the Apostles : then 
we must mention the Epistles of Paul : then we must 
place the acknowledged first Epistle of John, and, 
similarly, the admitted Epistle of Peter : after this 
may be placed, if it appear suitable, the Apocalypse of 
John ; the various opinions about which we shall set 
forth in proper time. And these are amongst the 
books universally owned (Homologoumena). Now, of 
opposed books (Antilegomena), which are, however, 



NEW TESTAMENT IN GENEEAL. 9 

acknowledged similarly by the many, are reckoned the 
Epistle called that of James, and that of Jude, and the 
second of Peter, and those named the second and third 
of John, or of some other of the same name. Amongst 
spurious writings are reckoned the Acts of Paul, and 
the book called the Shepherd, and the Apocalypse of 
Peter, and also the Epistle of Barnabas, and what are 
called the Instructions of the Apostles ; and also (as I 
said), if it appear suitable, the Apocalypse of John, 
which (as I said) some reject, but which others rank 
amongst the books universally received. And now 
some reckon amongst these the Gospel according to the 
Hebrews, which especially pleases those of the Hebrews 
who have received Christ. And these are all the books 
which are opposed. We have of necessity included 
these too in our catalogue, having distinguished the 
writings which, according to the accounts delivered by 
the Church, are true, genuine, and universally owned, 
and those others which, although known by many 
ecclesiastical writers, are not reckoned in the canon, 
but are opposed" — (1. iii. c. 25). 

From this passage we learn, that in the time of 
Eusebius — the latter part of the third century and 
the beginning of the fourth — all the twenty-seven 
books of the New Testament were known and received 
by Christians in general, — that there was discrimina- 
tion exercised as to what books ought to be included 
in the New Testament collection ; — that several books 



10 HISTOEIC EVIDENCE. 

professedly apostolic were rejected, but that none were 
included in the collection which we do not now re- 
ceive ; and none of those which we receive were abso- 
lutely rejected, although, as to a few of the number, 
there was some difference of opinion. 

Not long before Eusebius wrote his history, events 
had occurred which rendered it needful for the Church 
to discriminate accurately between its authoritative 
Scriptures and other books. The Diocletian persecu- 
tion, which commenced in the year 303, was directed 
even more against the sacred books of the Christians 
than against their persons. The endeavour was made 
to exterminate the Christian Scriptures : had this 
effort succeeded, it was thought that the form of belief 
which hindered the disciples of Christ from uniting in 
the popular idolatries, would at once fall to the ground. 
Such an effort had been made by Antiochus Epiphanes 
to destroy the Old Testament, and thus to annihilate 
Judaism. However foolish such an attempt may 
sound, there are facts which show that such an endea- 
vour to destroy a book may be successful. A century 
after the invention of printing, an Italian book, on 
" The Benefits which we receive by the Death of 
Christ," had passed through many editions, and was 
possessed (it is said) by almost every intelligent family 
in that peninsula. The question of heresy was raised 
— the free grace of the gospel of Christ was found to 
be set forth in this widely-circulated volume, and its 



NEW TESTAMENT IN GENEKAL. 11 

destruction was decreed. The machinery of the con- 
fessional was set in motion ; — all were required to sur- 
render their copies ; and thus the work disappeared so 
thoroughly, that its contents were only known from 
the accounts of contemporary writers. Ranke, in his 
" History of the Popes," says, that this book was as much 
lost, as the lost Decades of Livy. I may observe, that 
this volume, after a disappearance of three hundred 
years, has again been discovered in an English version, 
from which it has been re-translated into Italian, and 
printed, aud again employed as an instrument in the 
endeavours now carried on for introducing the light 
of the gospel of Christ into that land. That the pre- 
sent efforts to spread the gospel of Christ in that coun- 
try, the seat of Romish power and idolatry, may be 
blessed in spite of the existing persecutions, far more 
widely than was the case at the time of the Reforma- 
tion, must be the earnest desire and prayer of all who 
prize the gospel of Jesus Christ, and value the posses- 
sion of God's holy word. 

In the Diocletian persecution, the Christians through- 
out the Roman empire, from the Euphrates to the 
Atlantic, from the cataracts of the Nile to Britain, 
were required to give up their copies of the New Testa- 
ment to be destroyed : those who refused, suffered 
imprisonments, tortures, slavery, or death. Many 
refused to surrender the Scriptures, and endured the 
consequences ; others complied with the order of the 



12 HISTORIC EVIDENCE. 

emperors, and thence received, amongst Christians, 
the designation of Traditors, as though they had be- 
trayed the word of God, just as Judas had betrayed 
our blessed Lord Himself. There were also some who 
allowed the emissaries of the government to take away 
any books which were not Scripture ; some bishops placed 
books of the heathens, or of heretics, where the messen- 
gers of the magistrates were likely to search for copies of 
the Gospels. Indeed, not a few of those employed by 
the persecutors had but little zeal in the cause, so that 
(unlike the agents of the authorities in Italy, who are 
now so diligent in searching for copies of the Scrip- 
tures, and in arresting those who read them), they 
willingly took away whatever books were delivered to 
them, without inquiring whether they were the Chris- 
tian Scriptures or not. 

In consequence of this persecution, and the light in 
which the Traditors were regarded as subject to severe 
ecclesiastical discipline, it became really an anxious 
question, What are the sacred books of the Christians ? 
Hence the need of discrimination on this point. Who- 
ever gave up any of the books universally received, 
was a Traditor, — whoever gave up any of the books 
reckoned as spurious, was not subjected to any eccle- 
siastical discipline ; but from the general feeling of the 
many (as stated in the passage quoted from Eusebius), 
any who gave up the books opposed by some, would 
be looked on with doubt, and by most would be con- 



NEW TESTAMENT IN GENERAL. 13 

demned as Traditors. The importance of the ques- 
tion was felt as widely as was the diffusion of the 
Christian name. 

The conclusion is manifest, that two centuries after 
the death of the Apostle John, all the books of the 
New Testament were known and used as a collection, 
that they were received as universally owned, with the 
exception of five of the shorter Epistles and the Apo- 
calypse, of which some doubted. * 

"We may trace backwards, from Eusebius towards the 
days of the Apostles, so as to observe the notices which 
exist of the collected books of the New Testament. 

In the former half of the third century, there was 
no Church teacher so conspicuous, as an author, as 
Origen. He was born at Alexandria, about the year 
185, and he died, A.D. 254, ten years before the birth 
of Eusebius. In his writings he makes such extensive 
use of the New Testament, that although a very large 
number of his works are lost, and many others have 
come down to us only in defective Latin versions, we 
can in his extant Greek writings alone (I speak this 

* The fact of books of the New Testament being known and 
used as a collected volume, at the close of the third and begin- 
ning of the fourth century, is also evident from the manner in 
which Lactantius, at that period, speaks (Inst. 1. iv. c. 20) of the 
New Testament as comprising that portion of holy Scripture 
which was written after the passion of our Lord. 



14 HISTOEIC EVIDENCE. 

from actual knowledge and examination) find cited at 
least two-thirds of the New Testament ; so that, had 
such a thing been permitted as that the Gospels, and 
some of the other books, should have been lost, we 
might restore them in a great measure by means of 
the quotations in Origen. 

Origen passed a considerable portion of his life in 
Palestine; he had also visited Kome, so that his testi- 
mony to the books of the New Testament cannot be 
considered as belonging merely to his native locality 
of Alexandria. 

Eusebius (1. vi. c. 25) extracted from Origen's writ- 
ings such passages as mention the uncontroverted 
books of the New Testament. In these passages he 
speaks of the four Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, 
and John, as received by the whole Church which is 
under heaven. He mentions the Acts, as well as the 
Gospel, as the work of Luke. He speaks of the 
Epistles of St. Paul in a general manner (every one of 
which he cites in his writings). He mentions the 
Apocalypse as the work of the Apostle John, who 
wrote the Gospel and the first Epistle that bear his 
name. He speaks of the second and third Epistles of 
John as held to be doubtful by some ; the first Epistle 
of Peter he calls universally owned ; the second he 
speaks of as one about which there were doubts. In 
this sort of casual mention of the New Testament 
books, Origen does not speak of the Epistles of James 



NEW TESTAMENT IN GENEKAL. 15 

or Jude, both, of which, however, he uses in his works. 
In other passages of Origen, which are only extant 
in the old Latin version (which is not worthy of im- 
plicit confidence), lists may be found of all the New 
Testament writings as we receive them. 

I shall not now dwell on the manner in which 
Tertullian at Carthage, Clement of Alexandria, and 
Irenaeus, bishop of Lyons, at the beginning of the third 
and close of the second century, speak of the New 
Testament : — I shall have occasion to refer to these 
important witnesses when speaking of particular parts 
of the collected volume of the Christian Scriptures. 

The earliest notice of any collected books of the New 
Testament is found in a remarkable testimony of an 
unknown writer. The document to which I refer is 
commonly called the Canon in Muratori, because it 
was first published by that Italian scholar and anti- 
quary, from a MS. in the Ambrosian library at Milan. 
This document is defective at the beginning, and 
throughout it is grievously disfigured by the gross 
errors of the copyist. The ignorance of the transcriber 
makes, however, the testimony not at all the less for- 
cible. This canon, as it is called from containing a 
list of our canonical books, bears undoubted marks of 
being a translation, made from the Greek and Latin, 
by some one whose knowledge of the grammar and 
construction of the Latin language was very imperfect. 

In the beginning the writer is speaking of the four 



16 HISTOEIC EVIDENCE. 

Gospels. That part which, relates to St. Matthew and 
St. Mark is lost, except the concluding words : then St. 
Luke, the companion of the Apostle Paul, is mentioned 
as the author of the third Gospel, and St. John of the 
fourth ; St. John's first Epistle is next mentioned ; 
then the Acts of the Apostles as written by Luke ; 
then all those Epistles of St. Paul are spoken of to 
which his name is prefixed, and then the Apocalypse 
of St. John : then the writer speaks of some spurious 
works which were rejected, and adds, " It is not fitting 
to mix gall with honey. The Epistle of Jude, and 
two of the above-mentioned John, are reckoned 
amongst the Catholic writings." In saying the two 
Epistles, the writer may have known of but one of 
St. John's shorter Epistles, or, as it appears probable 
to me, he may mean two besides the first Epistle of 
which he had spoken before. He then continues in a 
sentence which is not very comprehensible — "and 
Wisdom, written by the friends of Solomon in his 
honour." This stands in almost unintelligible ob- 
scurity; — how it can find a place amongst New Testa- 
ment writings is difficult to be imagined ; and also what 
book is intended is by no means clear, — whether the 
apocryphal book, or Proverbs, to which this name of 
Wisdom was appended in the second century, — a book 
the latter part of which was written out by " the men 
of Hezekiah," and of which some chapters are the 
words of Agur and of king Lemuel. 



NEW TESTAMENT IN GENERAL. 17 

The writer thus concludes what he has to say of 
New Testament books, — "the Apocalypse, also, of John 
and Peter alone we receive, which [latter] indeed 
some amongst us do not choose to be read in the 
Church." — (Routtis Reliquice Sacrce, vol. i. p. 394.) 

Thus, this ancient canon recognises the four Gospels, 
the Acts, thirteen Epistles of St. Paul, and, in short, 
all the New Testament books, except the Epistle to 
the Hebrews, that of James, those of Peter, and per- 
haps the second or third of John: — it speaks of no 
book, as belonging to the New Testament, which we 
reject, except the Apocalypse of Peter, and even that 
is mentioned doubtfully. 

The author of this list of books speaks also of some 
which ought not to be received as of divine authority. 
He mentions "the Shepherd, written very recently in 
our own time, in the city of Rome, by Hennas, while 
Pius, his brother, was bishop of the see of Rome." 
This incidental remark supplies us with the date of the 
writer. Pius the first, bishop of Rome, died about the 
middle of the second century ; he appears to have suc- 
ceeded to the episcopate about the year 140. Thus, 
the list of New Testament books, which we have 
under consideration, cannot have been written at a 
much later period. And not only so, but as the writer 
speaks of the episcopate of Pius the first as being in 
his own days, his testimony reaches back as far, and 
probably farther. These were books known, and re- 



18 HISTORIC EVIDENCE. 

ceived, and used as divine Scripture in the former Half 
of the second century. 

It is often remarkable, when pursuing an historical 
inquiry of a kind wholly different, how we meet with 
the strongest possible evidence against the claims of 
the Papacy. This writer, in speaking of authentic 
Scripture, rests on known historic facts, instead of cut- 
ting short the investigation by appealing at once 
to the infallible authority of Pope Pius the first. 
And further, he mentions the book which the brother 
of this same Pius had put forth during his episcopate : 
now, this book is still in being ; and though many have 
treated it with most undeserved respect, imagining the 
author to be the Hermas whom St. Paul salutes in 
Rom. xvi., yet the absurdities, to use no stronger ex- 
pression, with which it is replete, evince that it is no 
exposition of Christian truth. If, then, Hermas put it 
forth with the sanction of his brother, the bishop, it 
would show that the then Pope could authorise a work 
both unedifying and unorthodox; if, however, Hermas 
put forth his idle fancies without the authorisation of 
his brother, the bishop, what possibility is there that 
any Roman censorship then existed ? How different 
were the claims of Rome in the clays of Pius the first 
from what we see in the days of Pius the ninth ! 

The existence of this Pius the first is a simple his- 
torical fact ; the time, too, is known approximately ; 
but in some of the lists of Popes he is numbered the 



NEW" TESTAMENT IN GENERAL. 19 

ninth, in some the tenth, and in others the eleventh ! 
Some make him the predecessor, some the successor, of 
Anicetus. Had the certainty of papal succession and 
transmission been the basis of all continued Chris- 
tianity, how uncomfortable would all these doubts 
and uncertainties make us ! It is well that the facts 
of the transmission of the Scripture rest on a firm and 
certain basis, independent of all questions of papal suc- 
cession. 

We are thus able to trace back lists of New Testa- 
ment books almost to the apostolic age : the author 
of the Canon in Muratori, from which I have been 
quoting, lived in the days of some who had been in 
part contemporaries of the Apostle John. We know 
from the natural course of events that this must have 
been the case. And we need not rely on deductions, 
however certain, for we know as a fact, that Polycarp, 
bishop of Smyrna, who had himself personally known 
St. John, laid down his life at a very advanced age as 
a martyr for Christ, about the year 168. Polycarp 
visited Rome, the place at which the author of this 
fragmentary list seems to have lived and written, after 
the middle of the second century — a visit memorable 
for the amicable contention between him and Anicetus, 
the Eoman bishop, about the proper time for the cele- 
bration of Easter : each remained unconvinced by the 
other, and each left the other to the exercise of his 



20 HISTORIC EVIDENCE. 

individual Christian liberty: — what a proof that the 
claims of infallibility and universal jurisdiction were as 
yet unknown ! 

We have thus proof that the New Testament books, 
in general, were in use as authoritative Scripture in 
the days of those who had lived in the apostolic age — - 
that they were ascribed to the same writers to whom 
we attribute them, and that several of them were 
classed together as being, though not as yet one 
collected volume, yet at least in some measure a 
' collection. 

For ancient writings in general we ask no more dis- 
tinct proof of genuineness : it is commonly regarded 
as quite sufficient, if a work is mentioned by one or 
more writers of the succeeding age, in such a way as 
to show that it was then known and used as the work 
of the author whose name it bears. 

With regard to the New Testament books, however, 
we can go much farther with our proofs, when we con- 
sider, not the volume as a collection, but the distinct 
parts of which the volume is composed. 

In the second century two collected portions of the 
New Testament were known and used by Christians, 
as read in their public assemblies ; the one of these 
contained the Epistles of St. Paul, to which his name 
is prefixed, the other comprised the four Gospels as a 
collected volume. Besides these there were other writ- 
ings used separately. 



st. paul's epistles. 21 

I will, therefore, first consider the evidence which 
relates to St. Paul's Epistles, — then that which bears 
on the authenticity of the Gospels, — then the other 
books must be considered separately : in this part of 
the subject a distinction must be made between those 
books of which Eusebius speaks as universally received, 
and those which he says were opposed by some. 

ST. PAUL'S EPISTLES. 

In the latter part of the second century we find 
testimony to the knowledge and use of thirteen Epistles 
of St. Paul, as certain and indubitable as we have that 
they are now known and used. The fact is alike 
admitted by friends and foes of Eevelation, that the 
Church then had these Epistles, even as we now have 
them, and that they attributed them to that Apostle. 
Proofs of this will be given presently. 

Now, the evidence by which letters are authenticated 
to future ages is often of a peculiar kind : a letter has 
not only a writer but also a party to whom it is ad- 
dressed. If I wish to bring forward a letter as an evi- 
dence, it is often sufficient if I can show that such letter 
has been preserved in proper custody; — if the party 
to whom it professes to be addressed preserves it as 
genuine, this is a presumption of the strongest kind 
that it is so : the business of proving that it is not so 
rests with the opposite party. 

Thus, those Epistles which are addressed to Churches 



22 HISTOEIC EVIDENCE. 

may be attested in a manner peculiarly strong, from 
the fact that such Churches preserved them and read 
them publicly and habitually. 

The collection of St. Paul's Epistles is sufficiently 
shown by the manner in which they are mentioned in 
the Canon in Muratori ; — that this reception of those 
documents was no private or local peculiarity is ma- 
nifest from the fact that they were equally used in 
Alexandria, at Carthage, and in Gaul. 

This is proved by the citations of Clement of Alex- 
andria, Tertullian, and Irenseus. This Clement, in 
the latter part of the second century, was the head 
of the catechetical school of Alexandria : he speaks of 
St. Paul's several Epistles by name, and cites them, 
with the single exception of the short Epistle to Phi- 
lemon ; this too would doubtless have been mentioned 
had he anywhere given a list of the Epistles.* He 
speaks of the Gospel collection under the name by 
which it was often designated, of Evangelium, and the 
collection of St. Paul's Epistles by the name of Apos- 
tolos, or Apostle, which was early appropriated to 
them : this name seems to have originated in the 

* The following are places in Clement of Alexandria, in which 
he cites the several Epistles : — Rom. Psed. p. 117, Strom, p. 457 
1 Cor. Psed. p. 96 ; 2 Cor. Strom, p. 514 ; Gal. Strom, p. 468 
Ephes. Psed. p. 88 ; Phi. Psed. p. 107 ; Col Strom, p. 277 
1 Thes. Psed. p. 88 ; 2 Thes. Strom, p. 554 ; 1 Tim. Strom 
p. 383 ; 2 Tim. Strom, p. 448 ; Titus, Strom, p. 299. 



st, paul's epistles. 23 

circumstance that the collection of Epistles then con- 
tained the writings of one Apostle. 

Contemporary with Clement was Irenasus, bishop of 
Lyons, in Gaul : he gives as explicit a testimony 
as possibly could be borne to the same collection of 
Epistles ; he mentions each of them, and cites them 
as familiar writings, with the same exception of the 
short Epistle to Philemon.* 

Tertullian was a presbyter in the north of Africa : 
he used all the thirteen Epistles to which St. Paul's 
name was attached : of that to Philemon he speaks as 
distinctly as of the rest, f 

Now, the manner in which these early writers used 
these Epistles does not merely prove that they them- 
selves knew them, and believed them to be genuine 
documents, but it does a great deal more, for it shows 

* The following references show passages in which Irenaeus 
cites the different Epistles : — Bom. 1. iii. c. 16, § 3 ; 1 Cor. 1.. iv. 
c. 27, § 3 ; 2 Cor. 1. iii. c. 7, § 1 ; Gal 1. iii. c. 16, § 3 ; Ephes. 
1. v. c. 2, § 3; Phi. 1. iv. c. 18, § 4 ; Col. 1. iii. c. 14, § 1 ; 

1 Thes. 1. v. c. 6, § 1 ; 2 Thes. 1. iii. c. 7, § 2 ; 1 Tim. 1. i. c. 1, 
§ 1 ; 2 Tim. 1. iii. c. 3, § 3 ; Titus, 1. iii. c. 3, § 4. 

■f Some of Tertullian' s citations are pointed out in the follow- 
ing references: — Rom. Scorp. c. 13; 1 Cor. De Praas. c. 33; 

2 Cor. De Pudic. c. 13; Gal. Adv. Marc. 1.5; Ephes. Adv, 
Marc. 1. 5 ; Phi. De Kes. Cam. c. 23 ; Col. De Praes. Hser. c. 7 ; 
1 Thes. De Ees. Carn. c. 24 ; 2 Thes. De Kes. Carn. c. 24 ; 
1 Tim. De Prees. Hser. c. 25 ; 2 Tim. Scorp. c. 13 ; Titus, De 
Praes. c. 6 ; Phile. Adv. Marc. 1. 5. 



24 HISTOEIC EVIDENCE. 

that Christians in general so received them at the time 
in question. These writers appeal to the Epistles as 
familiarly as a modern author or preacher would do ; 
the j habitually quote them, as though their authority 
were as much admitted by other Christians as by 
themselves. 

Now, such a testimony as this carries us of necessity 
a long way farther back than the mere point of time 
at which these men ivrote ; it takes us at least to the 
earliest period of their knowledge as Christians. It 
shows that even then this collection of writings, bear- 
ing the name of the Apostle Paul, was in circulation 
amongst the Churches both in the East and the West. 
It shows that this must have been the case, at least in 
the former part of the second century ; that is, in the 
days of the many who were then still living, who had 
belonged to the Church while it was still possessed of 
apostolic training. 

The weight which the diversity of the locations of 
these writers gives to their evidence, can hardly be 
over estimated. We have not a trace of such a thing 
as one part of the Church knowing this collection, and 
another not possessing it. It was the common posses- 
sion of the Christians, with which the teachers, and the 
communities which they taught, were alike acquainted. 

And further, it was not the Christian community 
alone which was acquainted with the collected Epistles 
of the Apostle Paul. In the second century, one of 



ST. PAUL'S EPISTLES. 25 

the most remarkable separatists from tlie Church, 
Marcion of Pontus, formed out a religious system for 
himself: he considered that St. Paul only fully under- 
stood the principles of true Christianity, and to his 
teaching he professed to adhere exclusively. Marcion's 
leading opinions were an entire rejection of the doc- 
trine of the incarnation and sufferings of the Son of 
God, and a rejection of the Old Testament, as some- 
thing which was not from the true God. He used as 
authoritative Scripture one Gospel, which contained 
the narrative of St. Luke, with the omission of all that 
related to the birth, etc., of Christ, and a collection of 
St. Paul's Epistles, from which he excluded (as we 
learn from Tertullian) those to Timothy and Titus : he 
retained that to Philemon, so that Marcion's knowledge 
of this short Epistle is so far valuable as an early 
acknowledgment of its existence, and that it was owned 
to be St. Paul's. The time when Marcion began to 
spread his peculiar opinions, from Pontus to Kome, 
was about the year 130 ; so that we have thus a further 
proof of St. Paul's Epistles having been collected and 
used in that form before that time. 

I said, that the testimony which connects any par- 
ticular document with a community to which it was 
addressed, possesses a peculiar force. In this point of 
view an appeal of Tertullian has no small value : by 
this allusion we learn, amongst other things, that 



26 HISTOEIC EVIDENCE. 

St. Paul's Epistles were read in the second century, in 
the Christian assemblies, as authoritative Scripture. 

He says : — " Come now, thou who desirest better to 
exercise thy curiosity in that which relates to thy sal- 
vation : go through the Apostolic Churches, in which 
the chairs of the Apostles preside in their places, in 
which their authentic letters are recited, resounding the 
voice and representing the face of each one. Is Achaia 
near thee ? Thou hast Corinth. If thou art not far 
from Macedonia, thou hast Philippi, thou hast Thessa- 
lonica. If thou canst direct thy course into Asia, thou 
hast Ephesus. But if thou art near Italy, thou hast 
Eome, whence authority is ready at hand for us also 
[at Carthage, where he was writing ; the authority is 
that of the Apostle, in his Epistle to the Romans]. 
How happy is that Church on which Apostles poured 
forth their whole doctrine with their blood ; where 
Peter suffered in the same manner as his Lord ; where 
Paul was crowned with the death of John [the Bap- 
tist] ; where the Apostle John, after he had been cast 
into the fiery oil and had suffered nothing, was banished 
to an island ! Let us see what it learned, what it taught : 
it accords with the Churches of Africa also. It knows 
one God, the Creator of all things, and Christ Jesus, 
born of the Virgin Mary, the Son of God the Creator, 
and it knows the resurrection of the flesh : it mingles 
the law and the prophets with the writings of the 
Evangelists and Apostles. 1 ' — (De Press. Hcer. cap. 36.) 



st. Paul's epistles. 27 

This last clause refers to the practice of reading 
equally in the Christian assemblies the Scriptures of the 
Old and New Testaments. 

It may now sound strange to hear Tertullian con- 
necting what the Church of Rome had learned from 
the Apostles with that which it taught others : — now 
we see the sad and solemn contrast. St. Paul taught 
it the free grace of the gospel — justification through 
faith in the one sacrifice of Christ : — "if thou shalt 
confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and believe in 
thine heart that God hath raised Him from the dead, 
thou shalt be saved." Does Eome teach this noiv ? It 
was to this Church that St. Paul addressed the warning 
to the Gentiles, who had been graffed into the good 
olive tree: — "if thou continue in his goodness, — 
otherwise thou also shalt be cut off." Was there 
not a solemn prophecy veiled under this conditional 
threatening ? 

The testimony of Tertullian, Clement of Alexandria, 
and Irenseus, connected as they all were with the apos- 
tolic age (especially Irenasus, as I shall have occasion 
to show), might suffice, as proving conclusively that, 
from the Apostles' days and onwards, these Epistles 
were used and read as St. Paul's, — that the Churches 
to which most of them were addressed owned them as 
such, and that their genuineness was a fact of common 
knowledge. In opposition to this, there is no evidence 
whatever ; it is not, in fact, a balance of testimony, for 



28 HISTOKIC EVIDENCE. 

all is on one side ; if, then, anything be said in op- 
position, it is only surmise and conjecture : of what 
weight are they in comparison with proved facts ? 

If these Epistles were not genuine, when could the 
falsification have taken place ? It could not have been 
later than the early years of the second century ; and 
then we must suppose that either it was a common 
conspiracy of all Christians to give currency to false 
Epistles, — a conspiracy in which Italy, Gaul, North 
Africa, Asia, and Egypt, and further, the heretic 
Marcion, in part, combined, — or else that the whole 
sprung from the pen of daring forgers, who not only 
persuaded all Christian communities that these Epistles 
proceeded from the Apostle Paul, but who even suc- 
ceeded in causing seven Churches to believe that they 
had received Epistles from St. Paul, which they never 
had received. Such are some of the difficulties which 
must be grappled with when conjectural endeavours 
are made to set aside the force of clear evidence. 

But we are able to carry our lines of evidence to 
some of these Epistles yet farther back. 

In the first century of our era lived Clement of 
Kome : we possess one genuine Epistle which he 
addressed to the Church at Corinth. The Church of 
Kome ranks this Clement as the first of her Popes of 
that name ; it is, however, unfortunate that some 
writers say he was the second Pope, others the third, 



st. paul's epistles. 29 

others the fourth, and others the fifth,* — so doubtful 
is the alleged papal succession at the very beginning. 

But leaving the advocates of Rome to settle such 
knotty points, the fact is indisputable that in the first cen- 
tury Clement addressed the Corinthian Church thus : — 

" Why then do we rend and tear in pieces the body 
of Christ, and raise seditions against our own body ? 
Your schism has perverted many ; it has dis- 
couraged many ; it has caused diffidence in many and 
grief in us all : and yet your sedition continues still. 
Take the Epistle of the blessed Paul the Apostle into 
your hands : — what did he first write to you in the 
beginning of the gospel ? In truth he wrote to you by 
the Spirit concerning himself and Cephas and Apollos, 
because that even then ye had made party-divisions." 
— (Ep. ad Cor. cap. 47.) 

Thus, in the first century, did one, whom after ages 
have designated as a Pope, write to a contentious 
Church ; he uses no anathematising threats ; he even 

* The early pontifical lists agree better in the names than in 
the order; some give the succession, 1, Peter; 2, Linus; 3, Cletus 
(or Anencletus) ; 4, Clement : others place Clement between 
Linus and Cletus ; others, again, divide Cletus or Anencletus 
into two persons (thus introducing a fictitious bishop) ; while 
others place Clement immediately after the Apostle Peter. This 
last opinion is not common in the Church of Rome ; it is, how- 
ever, maintained by the R. Cath. Prof. Hefele of Tubingen : see 
his Patres Apostolici, ed. 3, Prolegg. p. xxxvi. " colligimus . . . 
S. Clementem ipsi S. Petro successisse." 



30 HISTOEIC EVIDENCE. 

writes, not in his own name, but in that of " the 
Church that sojourneth at Kome ;" and the authority 
that he wielded was the Scripture written by St. Paul. 
Would that Clement XL, who professed to be the suc- 
cessor of this Clement, had been actuated by a similar 
spirit, instead of fulminating direful anathemas against 
any who maintain that " the reading of holy Scrip- 
ture is for all!" — (Constitution "Unigenitus") 

This Epistle of Clement seems to have been writ- 
ten before the destruction of Jerusalem (see Hefele, 
p. xxxv.) ; at all events it was in the first century, 
and not more than from thirty to forty years after that 
of St. Paul to the Corinthian Church, so that not a 
few would, in the ordinary course of things, be still 
living at that place to whom the rebuke of the Apostle 
had been addressed. 

Now, St. Paul's first Epistle to the Corinthians was 
one of solemn reprehension, and yet that Church held 
it fast as genuine- — a plain proof that it knew it to be 
such : the nature of the case, even if there were no 
other impossibilities, would preclude the thought of 
forgery. The Epistle was an evidence that con- 
demned them, and yet they preserved it. 

We find, too, from a letter of Dionysius, bishop of 
Corinth, to the Eoman Church in the second century, 
that the Corinthians publicly read also this Epistle of 
Clement ; so that it, too, receives its attestation from 
those whose practical conduct it condemned. 



st. paul's epistles. 31 

It is not my object now to speak directly of the 
authority and inspiration of the New Testament books ; 
this Epistle, however, attested as it is by strict lines of 
evidence of the strongest kind, &s actually written by 
St. Paul to the Corinthian Church, may call for a 
passing notice from the peculiar nature of its contents. 
The writer speaks of the miraculous powers in the gift 
of tongues which he himself possessed ; he mentions 
this as well known by those to whom he wrote ; and 
their reception and preservation of the Epistle is a 
proof that such was the fact ; as, endued with such 
powers, he claims such authority as to say, " If any 
man judge himself to be a prophet or spiritual, let him 
acknowledge the things that I write unto you are the 
commandments of the Lord." Tie claims authority 
from God, which the Corinthians knew to be confirmed 
by miraculous powers. And further, he speaks of such 
powers as bestowed on some of the Corinthians them- 
selves, — a plain proof of the reality of the whole state- 
ment : to imagine the contrary would not only include 
the supposition that the writer had lost his reason, but 
that also his readers at Corinth were all similarly 
afflicted. 

It is also worthy of notice how St. Paul speaks of 
the leading facts of Christianity as matters of common 
knowledge. His appeal to the then still surviving 
majority of a company of more than five hundred, who 
had themselves seen the Lord Jesus after his resurrec- 



32 HISTOEIC EVIDENCE. 

tion, carries with it the greatest force : it presents to 
us the evidence of a body of persons who knew from 
their own eyesight the truth of the leading miracle of 
the gospel. 

Clement of Eome does not make it his practice to 
quote the books of the New Testament expressly, 
although, as in the present case, it is evident that he 
was acquainted with them. I will, however, give one 
sentence of his: he says, — "casting away from our- 
selves all unrighteousness and wickedness, covetous- 
ness, debate, malignity and deceit, whisperings and 
backbitings, hatred of God, despitefulness and pride, 
vain-gloriousness and inanity. For those that com- 
mit such things are hated by God, and not only those 
that commit them, but those also that have pleasure 
in them." — {Ep. 1 ad Cor. cap. 35.) 

It would be a mere waste of words to seek to prove 
that Clement had Kom. i. 29-32 in his mind and 
memory. Such sequences of words and thoughts can- 
not be fortuitous. He is writing in the name of the 
Roman Church, which thus acknowledges the Epistle 
to the Romans. 

I turn from Clement to Poly carp, whom I have 
already mentioned. This ancient martyr of Christ 
addressed, in the early part of the second century, an 
Epistle to the Church of Philippi, in which he speaks 
of the Epistle which St. Paul had written to them — 



st. paul's epistles. 33 

(cap. iii.). A large part of this letter is such an inter- 
weaving of sentences from the Kew Testament books, as 
evinces plainly not only the knowledge of them on the 
part of the writer, but also the perfect familiarity of 
his mind with them — a familiarity as great as that 
which we should find in any modern sermon. 

The following are specimens: — "The love of 
money is the beginning of all sorrows : we brought 
nothing into this world, neither have ice anything to carry 
out" — (cap. iv.). In another place he says, " We must 
all stand before the judgment-seat of Christ, and each 
one must give account of himself" — (cap. vi.). In an- 
other passage he says, " Do we not knoiv that the saints 
shall judge the world, as Paul teaches?" — (Cap. xi.) 
Again, " Be ye angry and sin not, and let not the sun 
go down upon your wrath " — (cap. xii.). How dis- 
tinctly do we see that Polycarp uses the first Epistle to 
Timothy, that to the Eomans, the first to the Co- 
rinthians, and that to the Ephesians ! The use of the 
last-mentioned book is all the more striking from the 
sentence of the Old Testament being combined with 
the same addition. He also in another place refers to 
the same Epistle, saying, — " knowing that by grace ye 
are saved, not of works"* — (cap. i.). 



* In speaking of the Epistles, which bear St. Paul's name, 
as received in the former part of the second century, it is proper 
to state that the Epistle which the Church writers received as 

3 



34 HISTORIC EVIDENCE. 

We are thus able to trace the common use of a col- 
lection of Epistles, bearing St. Paul's name, to an early 
part of the second century : we can show that no pos- 
sibility of mistake could be admitted in such a case, for 
the testimony is given alike by many countries ; im- 
posture is equally impossible, for that could not be sup- 
posed without believing that all Christians everywhere 
were so possessed with a spirit of falsehood as to put 
forth holy writings as those of the Apostle Paul, and 
that for no imaginable reason, — and that this could be 
done without any trace of such an imposition being 
recorded, and without any voice being raised against 
it, either in the Church or amongst the bodies sepa- 
rated from it. No proof is more mathematically cer- 
tain than that by which the contrary is proved to be 
absurd or impossible. 

The testimonies which bring us back to the time of 
contemporaries of St. Paul, as to some of these Epistles, 
have no small cogency when we compare these Epistles 
together : they bear so thoroughly the impress of the 
same mind. 

Now, there are no ancient works possessed of greater 
weight of evidence than these writings before us. We 
receive Cicero's letters as genuine, and yet no one sup- 
that to the Ephesians, was styled, by Marcion, to the Laodiceans. 
Our copies call it, to the Ephesians ; the question, however, is 
not one of authenticity, but only of name in the address ; — both 
parties were equally agreed that it was written by St. Paul. 



THE FOUK GOSPELS. 35 

poses that we could find each one severally mentioned 
by an ancient writer ; the quotations from some are 
considered as evidence to the collection as such. Here 
how much stronger is the case ! These Epistles are all 
mentioned severally as existing in the former part of 
the second century — as being then known as docu- 
ments of established credit, — not some anonymous 
productions, but each bearing on its front the certifi- 
cate of its origin which was then, and had previously 
been, regarded as authentic. It would be impossible 
to be more absolutely certain even as to the letters of 
Eomaine or of John Newton. 

THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

I now pass on to the collected Gospels. 

There is, to some minds, a difficulty in grasping the 
events of ages long past as definitely as if they had 
been of more recent occurrence. Let us then consider 
the collected Gospels, not as living, in the nineteenth 
century, on the shore of the English Channel, but as 
those might do, who, in the second century, dwelt on 
the banks of the Rhone. 

We find there a venerable teacher, Irenseus, the 
bishop of the Church at Lyons ; from him we may 
ask for information on this subject. What can he tell 
us of the collected Gospels which the Christians used? 

Irenseus says that the Gospels were four, and he 
gives most elaborate illustrations to show (as he thinks) 



36 HISTOEIC EVIDENCE. 

that their number could neither be greater nor less. 
He illustrates his opinion by comparing the four faces 
of the cherubim with the four Evangelists ; and he rests 
so fully on the Gospels being then known as a collec- 
tion , that he calls the volume " a fourfold Gospel" 
He describes them severally thus : — 

" That which is according to John narrates Christ's 
princely, potential, and glorious generation, saying, 
' In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was 
with God, and the Word was God,' and ' all things 
were made by Him, and without Him was not any- 
thing made that was made.' Wherefore that Gospel 
is full of all confidence, for his person is such. Now, 
that which is according to Luke, having a priestly 
impress, commenced with Zacharias the priest burn- 
ing incense to God. For now was the fatted calf pre- 
pared, which should be slain, because of the finding 
again of the younger son. Matthew preaches his 
birth according to man, saying, ' The book of the 
generation of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son 
of Abraham ;' and again, ' Now the birth of Christ was 
on this wise.' This Gospel, then, is of a human form, 
on which account, throughout the whole of the Gospel, 
the meek and lowly man is kept up. Mark com- 
menced from the prophetic spirit descending from on 
high upon men, saying, ' The beginning of the Gospel 
of Jesus Christ, as it is written in Isaiah the prophet' " 
— (l.ii. c. 11, §8). 



THE FOUR GOSPELS. 37 

He speaks so repeatedly and habitually of the four 
Gospels and their authors, that no doubt can exist as 
to his testimony on the subject. 

But could this reception of these four Gospels be a 
mere local peculiarity?- — we may, in reply, look from 
the shore of the Khone to the land of Irenseus's early 
life : his testimony relates, not merely to the West, 
but also to Asia Minor, for that was the land of his 
Christian training. We may turn also to Egypt, 
where Clement of Alexandria gives, at the same time, 
an according testimony to the same four Gospels. So, 
too, we may look at Carthage, where, as we learn from 
Tertullian, who at this very time had arrived at man's 
estate, the same Gospels were used as the works of the 
same authors. 

But did this unity, in the reception of the Gospel 
collection, originate in papal authority ? Have we no 
traces of such claims at dominion over conscience, and 
may not this have influenced Irenseus and others ? 
Now, we have at this very time a remarkable claim 
made by the bishop of Kome — a claim, however, 
which this very Irenseus, to whom we refer, resisted. 
The differences in the Church, as to the time of cele- 
brating Easter, still continued ; and Victor, bishop of 
Eome, usurped the authority of excluding from the 
fellowship of the Church the Asiatic bishops and com- 
munities that did not accord in judgment with him 
as to this point. 



38 HISTORIC EVIDENCE. 

This caused Irenaeus to write to Victor in terms of 
earnest remonstrance, so that he clearly shows that 
as yet no one Chnrch possessed such dominant power 
over others, as that books of Scripture or anything 
else could be received on its authority. 

We may thus look around us from the shores of 
the Ehone, and in whatever direction we turn, at the 
latter part of the second century, we find the Christian 
communities holding the same Gospels which they con- 
sidered that they had received from the Apostolic age. 

But in what relation did Christian teachers then, 
such as Irenseus, stand to the times of the Apostles ? 
Irenaeus himself shall tell us. He says, in addressing 
Florinus, who had introduced erroneous doctrines, — 

" Thou didst never receive these doctrines from the 
elders who preceded us, who themselves had associated 
with the Apostles. When I was yet a boy, I saw thee 
in company with Polycarp in Asia Minor ; for I re- 
member what took place then better than what happens 
now. What we heard in childhood grows along with 
the soul, and becomes one with it, so that I can 
describe the place where the blessed Polycarp sat and 
spoke, his going in and out, his manner of life and the 
form of his person ; the discourses which he delivered 
to the congregation ; how he told of his intercourse 
with John and with the rest who had seen the Lord ; 
how he reported their sayings, and what he had heard 
from them respecting the Lord, his miracles and his 



THE FOUR GOSPELS. 39 

doctrines. All these things were told by Polycarp in 
accordance with holy Scripture, as he had received 
them from the eye-witnesses of the doctrine of salva- 
tion. Through the grace of God, given to me even 
then, did I listen to these things with eagerness ; and 
wrote them down, not on paper, but in my heart ; and 
by the grace of God, I constantly revive them again 
fresh before my memory. And I can witness, before 
God, that if the blessed and apostolic presbyter had 
heard such things, he would have cried out, stopped 
his ears, and (according to his custom) have said, ' 
my good God ! upon what times hast thou brought 
me, that I must endure this !' And he would have 
fled away from the place where seated or standing he 
had heard such discourses." 

Such was the simple and definite line of information 
that connected Irenaeus with the age of the Apostles. 

From Justin Martyr we learn something of the 
sacred books of the Christians, in which the history of 
our Lord was contained, which were in use amongst 
them in the former half of the second century. 

This early Christian writer was born at Shechem, in 
Palestine, about (as is supposed) the year 90. After a 
vain search, for satisfaction, in the schools of philo- 
sophy, he became a Christian. In his first Apology, 
addressed to the emperor, Antoninus Pius, he describes 
the worship of the Christians ; and after having men- 
tioned what was written by " the Apostles in the Me- 



40 HISTORIC EVIDENCE. 

morials, which, they have made, which are called 
Gospels" he says, that on Sunday the Christians, 
whether in cities or in country-places, held an united 
assembly, in which " the Memorials of the Apostles 
or the Writings of the Prophets are read, as time may 
permit."* In another place he describes these Chris- 

* The following is Justin's full description of Christian wor- 
ship in the second century : — 

" On the day called Sunday, there is an assembly in one place 
of all who dwell in the cities or in the country, and the Memo- 
rials of the Apostles or the Writings of the Prophets are read, as 
time may permit. Afterwards, when he who reads has ended, 
he who presides admonishes and exhorts, by word, to imitate 
these good things. Afterwards, we all stand up together and 
pray ; and, as we said before, when we have made an end of 
prayer, bread is brought, and wine, and water, and he who pre- 
sides offers prayers and thanksgivings according to his ability, 
and the people add their assent, saying, Amen ; and those things 
for which thanks were given are distributed, and are partaken of 
by each one ; and they are sent by the deacons to those who are 
not present. Those who are well-off, and who wish it, con- 
tribute, each one according to his own purpose what he wishes, 
and the collection is deposited with him who presides ; and he 
assists orphans and widows, and those who are in need, through 
sickness or other cause, and those who are in bonds, and stran- 
gers who may be sojourning in the place ; and, in fact, he takes 
care of all who may be in need. 

" TVe all hold this united assembly on Sunday, since it is 
the first day, in which God turned aside darkness and matter, 
and made the world ; and Jesus Christ, our Saviour, on the same 



THE FOUR GOSPELS. 41 

tian writings more exactly ; lie says, "the Memorials 
which were drawn tip by the Apostles and their com- 
panions." 

Now, I wish to direct your attention to the manner 
in which Justin speaks of the public and habitual 
reading of the Gospels in the Christian assemblies. 
He mentions it to the emperor as a fact open to the 
knowledge of all. Justin's testimony is good enough 
to prove it ; but it rests on a yet stronger ground of 
evidence, for it must have been habitually true if it 
could be thus mentioned. 

Thus, when Melanchthon said, in the Augsburg Con- 
fession, " The Churches amongst us teach, with general 
consent, . . . that men cannot be justified before God 
by their own powers, merits, or works, but that they 
are justified freely for Christ's sake, through faith," the 
statement carried with it the guarantee of its truth. 
Now, Justin was well acquainted with the Christian 
communities in many parts : he had sojourned at 
Ephesus, Alexandria, and Koine ; and it is evident 
that the memorials called Gospels, written by the 
Apostles and their companions, were thus used in all 
the Churches of which Justin knew aught. Justin's 
writings contain repeated citations which substantially 

day arose froni the dead ; for they crucified him the day before 
Saturday ; and on the day after Saturday, which is Sunday, he 
was manifested to his apostles and disciples, and taught them 
things which we have offered, likewise, for your attention," 



42 HISTOKIC EVIDENCE. 

accord with our four Gospels ; so that these citations 
might show, that the books which the Church uni- 
versally used in the days when Irenasus wrote, were the 
same that were in the hands of Justin. It is true that 
Justin cites loosely enough, and that he quotes from 
the Gospels two things that are not in ours ; he cites, 
however, the Old Testament just as loosely, and refers 
to the Pentateuch for two facts which it does not con- 
tain : no one would, therefore, think that his Penta- 
teuch was different from ours. 

And yet some have said, that Justin only used 
apocryphal Gospels : if so, they must have resembled 
ours most marvellously, and they must have been 
attributed to authors who might be similarly described. 
And besides this, the whole of the Churches must have 
used the same apocryphal Gospels ; and this must have 
been the case in the boyhood of that very Irenasus, who 
is so explicit a witness to our four Gospels. It certainly 
would require some degree of credulity to believe that 
all the Churches everywhere did, between the years 
150 and 175, change the Gospels which they read pub- 
licly every Lord's-day. Had they done this, how could 
they have received the newly-adopted documents with 
such reverence as they did ? In fact, the identity of 
Justin's Gospels with those mentioned by Irenseus, is 
more strongly evinced by the moral impossibilities im- 
plied in the contrary supposition, than it could be in 
any other way. 



THE FOUR GOSPELS. 43 

We have, however, direct evidence also : for Tatian 
composed a kind of harmony of the Gospels, which 
was known by the name of Dia Tessaron, i. e. " of the 
four," from its being an interwoven narrative from four 
Gospels. We learn from Irenaeus himself, that this 
Tatian was a disciple of Justin Martyr, and that he 
fell into doctrinal errors, such as the condemnation of 
marriage, after his teacher's death. Tatian's Gospels 
were then evidently identical with those of Justin. 
We may also notice that the writer of the Canon in 
Muratori speaks of the Gospels of Luke and John by 
name, as the third and fourth ; those of Matthew and 
Mark must undoubtedly have been described in the 
lost part of this fragment. 

If, then, we see that the Churches everywhere used 
our four Gospels immediately after the apostolic age, 
and in the lifetime of the tens of thousands of Christians 
who had been contemporaries with the Apostles, it 
follows that this was nothing newly or suddenly 
adopted, but that it sprung even from the time when 
the apostolic guidance still continued. And what could 
have caused all Christians everywhere to read in public 
these four narratives, as the works of the Apostles 
Matthew and John, and of Mark and Luke, two com- 
panions of Apostles, except that they knew, as a fact, 
that these were their real authors ? 

I have dwelt long on a very plain case, simply be- 
cause, in the present day, this is the very point of 



44 HISTOEIC EVIDENCE. 

Christian evidence which is specially opposed. It is 
said that our four Gospels are not historical narratives, 
but that they came into existence at a later period than 
the time of the Apostles : that the accounts of Christ 
were at first myths, and that they were gradually em- 
bodied in a definite form. By a myth they seem to 
mean the personification of an idea : a mythic person 
would be the supposed character of a fable ; — and to 
this they would bring down all that we know of the 
life and actions of our Lord. They say, that if we hold 
the Christ of our apprehension aright, it matters little 
whether we retain the belief in an historical Christ.* 

* The process of supposed ratiocination, by which historical 
facts and persons in Scripture are reduced to mere myths, is 
something of the following kind. It is assumed that man had 
an intuitive consciousness of his own want of a deliverer ; that 
this want led to the process of thinking out what sort of a 
deliverer was suited to the need, and how this redeemer should 
act in order to work out man's salvation : these ideas (it is then 
assumed) led to the thought of the incarnation of a divine person, 
— to his being supposed to have died, and risen, etc. ; and then 
it is assumed that the Gospels sprung into existence at a later 
period, when these supposed thoughts had assumed a concrete 
form in the minds of those who had received them. But does 
man naturally know his need of such a salvation as that which 
God sets forth, through faith, in the blood of Jesus Christ ? So 
far from this being the case, the scheme of Christianity runs 
directly counter to man's preconceived thoughts. The Cross of 
Christ was, indeed, to the Jews a stumbling-block, and to the 
Greeks foolishness. The mythic theory is a present proof how 



THE TOUR GOSPELS. 45 

It is difficult to analyse such vague thoughts. This, 
however, I know, that if the New Testament possesses 
one particle of authenticity, then the historical Christ 
is the person to whom it points. I can apprehend no 

little minds now like the mode of salvation set forth in the !N"ew 
Testament. 

It is in vain to endeavour to set aside the existence and acts 
of historic personages by calling them myths. Julius Caesar 
would make (on the novel theory) a thorough myth. The re- 
corded events of his life are so peculiar, — his connection with 
such varied countries, his actings from Britain to Egypt, might 
all be pronounced as proofs that he was not an historic person ; 
he might thus be easily explained away into the embodiment of 
the idea of the transition of the Koman state from a republic to 
an empire, — of the spread of Roman institutions into the West 
and East, and the introduction of Roman civilization into bar- 
barous countries, such as Gaul and Britain. It might be sug- 
gested that some British writer gave the myth its form ; for 
otherwise, why should his military success in Britain be repre- 
sented as so incomplete ? It might be argued that the accounts 
of Caesar's death show the whole to be mythic ; for how else 
could the Roman senate solemnly confirm all Caesar's acts, and 
yet proclaim an amnesty for those who had assassinated him ? 
Might not the fact, also, of the name of Casar being used in all 
succeeding ages as a title, be taken as a proof of the absence of 
historic reality as to the alleged Julius Caesar ? 

These points are strong when compared with what the mythic 
theory has to object to the reality of Jesus Christ. What shall 
be said of a system which owns that man needs a Saviour, and 
yet deprives him of the historic reality of that Saviour to whom 
the Scripture testifies ! 



46 HISTORIC EVIDENCE. 

Christ, no deliverer of guilty man, except that historical 
person — the eternal Son of God, who became man, to 
redeem us men by the shedding of his blood, and who 
has risen again, and now sitteth at the right hand of 
God, from whence He shall come to be the Judge of 
quick and dead. Our warrant for believing in this 
Christ is the record which we possess in the New 
Testament. 

It is, indeed, marvellous how any imagination can 
have run so wild, as to think that a supposed myth 
about a supposed Christ can have become embodied in 
four narratives so simple and definite, and that the real 
fact of Christianity can have sprung out of such fancied 
dreams. 

But it is said that, at this distance of time, the great- 
est uncertainty must of course spread over the scene. 
Nay, but lapse of time makes no difference with regard 
to proved facts : that which is proved to have been 
known truth eighteen hundred years ago, is known 
truth still. It is as certain now that Julius Caesar in- 
vaded Britain, as it was at the Christian era. But we 
have no occasion to look at these things from a long 
distance. We can take our stand in the latter part of 
the second century, and look back from that era to the 
apostolic age. The opponents admit that our four 
Gospels were in general use A. D. 175. They suggest, 
however, that they came into existence, at least in their 
present form, between the year 150 and that year ; 



THE FOUR, GOSPELS. 47 

that is to say, by some unknown and unrecorded cause, 
the Christians were induced everywhere in twenty-five 
years to adopt our Gospels, and also to believe that they 
had possessed them from the apostolic age. This is 
mythic and unhistorical with a vengeance. 

It presents difficulties enough to be explained. The 
number of the copies of the Gospels which were in use 
at the admitted date, A. D. 175, would be, at a very 
moderate computation, sixty thousand, amongst the 
Christian communities throughout the Eoman empire ; 
— and all these copies must have been received and 
used without any opposing voice being raised ! 

Standing at the year 175, we might find enough 
individuals living who still remembered the apostolic 
age : they had only to look back seventy-five years, — 
as long as we have to the old American war; — it was 
not six months ago* that Dr. Routh, president of 
Magdalen College, Oxford, was speaking to me, with 
clear memory, of events which occurred then and be- 
fore, when he was a student in that University. 

It is thus £>f importance to trace our Gospels, step by 
step, backwards through the second century, for thus 
we show the baselessness of the mythic, unhistoric 
theory. And now, as to single Gospels, we can go yet 
further in our notices than we can of the collected 
volume. 

* That is, when this Lecture was delivered, October, 1851. 



48 HISTOEIC EVIDENCE. 

At the close of the first century there were living at 
Ephesus, besides the Apostle John, two others of the 
immediate disciples of our Lord when on earth, — 
John the Presbyter, and Aristion.* Now, we know 
from Papias, bishop of Hierapolis, what John the 
Presbyter stated concerning the Gospels of Matthew 
and Mark : of Mark, he says, that he was the inter- 
preter of Peter, and though not a hearer or follower of 
our Lord himself, he wrote down very carefully what 
Peter had narrated ; so that (he adds) " he erred in 
nothing." This testimony of an immediate disciple of 
Christ is deeply interesting. He speaks as clearly of 
St. Matthew's Gospel, mentioning that he wrote it in 
Hebrew. 

The endeavour to evade the force of this evidence is 
made to rest on the singular theory that John the 

* The words of Eusebius (iii. 39) are, " Aristion, and John 
the Presbyter, the disciples of the Lord." In the "Edinburgh 
Review," July, 1851, p. 37, note, it is said that the words, " the 
disciples of the Lord," '■'•are probably an interpolation.'''' No 
reason is given why we should so regard them ; #ind in looking 
at Dr. Burton's critical edition of "Eusebius's Ecclesiastical 
History," it appears that there is no authority whatever for ex- 
punging them. Not only is all external evidence in their favour, 
but also, if they were omitted, there would be no purpose in 
mentioning John the Presbyter, and Aristion, in the passage, had 
they not been like Andrew, Peter, and the others, whose names 
are introduced, themselves immediate disciples of Christ when 
on earth. 



THE FOUR GOSPELS. 49 

Presbyter, and Papias who records his words, did not 
mean our Gospels of Matthew and Mark, but some 
other books of which we have no account whatever, 
which bore the same names ! Suppose we were to 
suggest that the history of Thucydides, which we pos- 
sess, is not that which the ancients cite as such, but 
another book bearing the same name. What would 
be said to this idea ? 

I have already shown how Polycarp interweaves in 
his epistle, words and sentences from the Epistles of 
the Apostle Paul : we find a similar introduction of 
words which exist in our Gospels. He writes thus: — 
"The Lord said, Judge not that ye be not judged; 
forgive and ye shall be forgiven ; be merciful that 
ye may obtain mercy. With what measure ye mete it 
shall be measured to you again. And, Blessed are the 
poor, and they that are persecuted for righteousness 
sake, for theirs is the kingdom of God" — (cap. 2). 
In another place, " The Lord said, The spirit truly is 
willing, but the flesh is weak" — (cap. 7). 

Clement of Rome, also, in his epistle has this state- 
ment : — "The Lord said, Be merciful that ye may 
obtain mercy ; forgive that ye may be forgiven ; as 
ye do so shall it be done to you ; as ye give so shall it 
be given to you ; as ye judge so shall ye be judged; 

with what measure ye mete, therewith shall 

it be measured to you" — (cap. 13). 

These sentences, especially those of Polycarp, appear 



50 HISTORIC EVIDENCE. 

like references, more or less exact, to the Gospels of 
Matthew and Luke : the only reason for doubting is 
that these writers might have had some oral know- 
ledge of this teaching of our Lord : — they refer, how- 
ever, to what he said, as if those to whom they wrote 
knew of these things likewise. 

St. Paul, in his first Epistle to Timothy, speaks thus : 
— " The Scripture saith, Thou shalt not muzzle the ox 
that treadeth out the corn;" and, " The labourer is wor- 
thy of his reward." This latter sentence is found only 
in Luke x. 7 ; it appears to be linked by the Apostle 
with the citation from the Law under the common 
term of Scripture. There is, I believe, in the New 
Testament no instance of two sentences, joined by the 
copulative, being introduced with such a phrase as 
" the Scripture saith," when the latter is merely an 
addition. I have no doubt myself that St. Paul gives 
us the earliest testimony, and that of an authoritative 
kind, to the Gospel of Luke, his companion. 

Besides the evidence of writers who belonged to the 
Church, we may (as Irenagus himself did) appeal to 
the Gnostic sects, who made more or less use of our 
Gospels. Thus, Marcion's Gospel was a truncated copy 
of St. Luke's, from which he extruded what struck 
him as inconsistent with his notion that our Lord pos- 
sessed no real humanity: he left, however, unarnputated 
quite enough to refute his strange ideas. Indeed, while 



THE FOUR GOSPELS. 51 

the different bodies separated from the Church showed 
that they were acquainted, in the second century, with all 
our four Gospels, it is pointed out by Irenasus that each 
Gospel, separately, was upheld by some one particular 
party, — a plain proof of their existence before these 
bodies quitted the communion of the Church. 

Celsus, the heathen philosopher, who wrote at 
length against the Christians and their religion, is an 
important witness to the early existence and use of our 
Gospels. 

Thus, then, we have distinct historic grounds for 
holding fast the Epistles which bear St. Paul's name 
as being his genuine works, and for ascribing the four 
Gospels to the authors whose names they bear, that is, 
to use the words of Justin Martyr, " Apostles and 
their companions." 

I have not rested on other evidence, such as that of 
undesigned coincidence, by which Paley demonstrates 
so satisfactorily that the Epistles of St. Paul and the 
book of Acts are alike genuine works, — that they 
could not, in fact, be forgeries : this evidence is of a 
kind extremely cogent. 



52 HISTOEIC EVIDENCE. 



ACTS OF THE APOSTLES. 

In passing on to the remaining books, I begin with 
the Acts of the Apostles : this book was, in the second 
century, known and received as the work of Luke, as 
much as his Gospel. I need only refer to Irenseus. 
Clement of Alexandria, and Tertullian,* as witnesses 
against whose testimony no exception can be made. 
The Canon in Muratori is also a valuable document as 
to this book. I need not enlarge on this ; for the 
testimony is sufficient to carry us to the time of those 
who belonged to the Apostolic age. 



EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS. 

In speaking of the Epistles to which St. Paul's name 
is prefixed, that to the Hebrews was of course ex- 
cluded. The difficulty, as to this Epistle, is not on 
the points of antiquity arid authority, but entirely as 
to authorship. In the early centuries it was but little 
known in the "West, and thus, in the Canon in Mura- 
tori, it is not mentioned. In the East, however, it 
was well known and received, — and there it was as- 
cribed to the Apostle Paul. Clement of Alexandria 

* Iren. 1. iii. c. 14, § 1 ; Clem. Strom, p. 588 ; Tert. De Jejun., 
c. 10, etc., etc., etc. 



EPISTLE TO THE HEBEEWS. 53 

is a sufficient witness on this point.* The North 
African Church, likewise, knew of this Epistle at an 
early period ; for Tertullian quotes it, ascribing it, 
however, to Barnabas, f All the early accounts would 
show that it was considered to come from what might 
be called the school of St. Paul, whether written by 
himself or not. Though the West had comparatively 
little knowledge of this Epistle in the second century, 
yet it must have been known there, in the first cen- 
tury, as an approved document ; for Clement of Rome, 
in his Epistle to the Corinthians, interweaves large 
portions of the Epistle before us. It has been said 
that "allusions prove nothing"; however, in such a 
case as this they prove a great deal. This Epistle 
claims authority on the part of the writer ; he, there- 
fore, who could approvingly introduce extracts from it 
into another work, so far sanctions that authority ; and 
this Clement of Rome has done. \ "We are able, there- 
fore, to say that in the Apostolic age it was received as 
an authoritative document. In the former part of the 
second century, Justin Martyr (Apol. i.) says, that 
Christ is called an Apostle, — a term which indicates his 

* Strom, p. 645 ; see also in Euseb. H. E. I. vi. 13, 14. 

f De Pudjc. c. 20. 

I It would fill several pages to give the reiterated passages in 
which Clement interweaves the words and order of thoughts of 
the Epistle to the Hebrews. 



54 HISTOKIC EVIDENCE. 

acquaintance with this Epistle, and his acknowledg- 
ment of its authority. The difficulty connected with 
its authorship being directly ascribed to St. Paul, is 
principally found in the omission of his name at the 
beginning, and the difference of style throughout. 
Thus, some of those who ascribed it in a general sense 
to St. Paul, thought that the ideas were his, but that 
the language was that of another ; in fact, that it bore 
the same relation to St. Paul, as St. Luke's Gospel 
does to him, and St. Mark's to St. Peter. Thus 
Origen, who quotes this Epistle as St. Paul's, says, 
that of the actual writer " God only knoweth."* 
Ancient testimony is abundantly strong as to the 
authority of this book ; it generally ascribes it to 
St. Paul ; — and this is quite sufficient for us to receive 
it with all confidence, and to consider it as Pauline in 
the same general sense. 

CATHOLIC EPISTLES. 

FIRST EPISTLE OF PETER. 

The Catholic Epistles were not formed into a col- 
lected volume at an early period : they were only 
known and used individually. Hence, we cannot be 
surprised that some of them were much better known 
than others. Two only of these writings stand in 

* Cited in Euseb. Hist. Ecc. 1. vi. 25. 



CATHOLIC EPISTLES. 55 

Eusebius's catalogue of books universally acknow- 
ledged. 

The first Epistle of Peter need not detain us long : 
Polycarp uses it as freely and fully as a modern 
preacher might do. * Papias, in the same age, cited tes- 
timonies from it, as we learn from Eusebius (1. iii. 39). 
Clement of Alexandria and Irenseus quote it Jty name, 
in the second century, as also does Tertullian : f he 
only, however, cites it in one passage, instead of 
making the continual use of it that he does of the 
Gospels and St. Paul's Epistles. This is natural 
enough, as this writing was only a separate volume, 
and not part of the collections already formed. 

FIRST EPISTLE OF JOHN. 

The first Epistle of John was also used by Polycarp 
and Papias,J and by the writers of the second century, 

* The following is the first passage of Polycarp in which he 
interweaves the words of 1 Peter, and this may serve as a 
specimen of the rest. " In whom though ye see Him not ye be- 
lieve ; and believing ye rejoice with joy unutterable and full of 
glory 1 '— (cap. i.). 

f Iren. 1. iv. c. 9, § 2 ; Clem. Alex. Strom, p. 493 ; Tert. 
Scorp. c. 12, 14. 

% Papias in Euseb. H. E. 1. iii. 39 ; Polyc. cap. 7, " For every 
one that confesseth not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh, is 
Antichrist." 



56 HISTORIC EVIDENCE. 

Irenasus, Clement, and Tertullian* by name, as is also 
the case in the Canon in Muratori. 



BOOKS OPPOSED BY SOME. 
EPISTLE OF JAMES. 

The Epistle of James is the first book that we have 
to consider, of those described by Eusebius as opposed 
by some. 

We are not (as I said already) to feel surprise that 
Epistles not addressed to a particular Church should 
be for a time comparatively unknown ; this would 
especially be what we might expect as to an Epistle 
to those from amongst the Israelitish nation who had 
believed in Christ. 

The first who makes express mention of this Epistle 
by name, is Origen, in the former part of the third cen- 
tury : he quotes it as the Epistle attributed to James. 
Hence, it is probable that Origen's teacher, Clement of 
Alexandria, knew of this Epistle : this supposition is 
confirmed by a statement of Cassiodorus, a writer of 
the sixth century, that Clement gave a summary of 
this Epistle (together with others) in a work of his 
which is now lost : it has, however, been doubted 

* Iren. 1. iii. c. 16, § 3, etc. ; Clem. Pyedog, p. 257, etc. ; Tert. 
Scorp. c. 12, etc. 



CATHOLIC EPISTLES. 57 

whether the name of James, in the passage of Cassio- 
dorus, is not put in mistake for Jude. Irenasus says of 
Abraham, that u he was called the friend of God" — 
(1. iii. c. 16, § 2). This looks like an acquaintance with 
this Epistle. A strong testimony to this writing is 
given by the old Syriac version of the New Testament, 
in which, although the other books " opposed by 
some" are absent, this Epistle is contained. In the 
fourth century we see, from Jerome, that the authen- 
ticity of this Epistle was very plainly asserted, and 
the Epistle was then, as now, ascribed to the Apostle 
James, the son of Alphseus. This is just what we 
might expect : a writing, little known at first, obtains 
a more general circulation, and the knowledge of the 
writing and its reception go almost together. The 
contents entirely befit the antiquity which the writing 
claims : no evidence could be given for rejecting it : it 
differs in its whole nature from the foolish and spuri- 
ous writings put forth in the name of this James; and 
thus its gradual reception is to be accounted for from 
its having, from early times, been known by some to 
be genuine (as shown by the Syriac version), and this 
knowledge having afterwards spread more widely. 



58 HISTORIC EVIDENCE. 



SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER. 

The second Epistle of Peter was but little known in 
early times: — it professes (ch. iii. 1) to be addressed 
to the same persons as the first Epistle had been. 
Cappadocia is one of the countries mentioned in the 
salutation of the former : — this then must be supposed 
to have been best known in that and the surrounding 
regions. Accordingly, from Cappadocia we get the 
earliest decisive testimony. In the middle of the third 
century, Firmilianus, bishop of Caesarea, in Cappa- 
docia, writes to Cyprian, accusing the bishop of Rome 
of " abusing the holy Apostles, Peter and Paul, who 
in their Epistles have execrated heretics, and ad- 
monished us to avoid them." The mention of Peter 
can only carry our minds to this Epistle. We learn 
from Origen that it was known at this time as a writ- 
ing about which there were doubts : he knew of no 
evidence against it, and the doubts then entertained 
are well balanced by Firmilianus's distinct testimony, 
springing from that very region to which we might 
especially look for evidence. This Epistle is not men- 
tioned by Tertullian, — a fact at which we need not 
wonder, since he only quotes the first Epistle of Peter, 
although universally owned, once. Eusebius tells us 
that Clement of Alexandria commented on the Catholic 
Epistles, both those which were universally owned, 



CATHOLIC EPISTLES. 59 

and those which are opposed by some : hence, it has 
been reasonably concluded that he knew this Epistle. 
This writing certainly is utterly unlike the forged 
documents, in the name of Peter, which were put 
forth in the second century : it belongs, at least, to an 
age anterior to that of Firmilianus and Origen, and 
thus we approach the Apostolic periud. Now, Cle- 
ment of Kome has a passage which seems to allude to 
part of this Epistle : he says, — " On account of hos- 
pitality and godliness, Lot was delivered from Sodom, 
when all the neighbouring country was condemned 
with fire and brimstone. The Lord made it manifest 
that He doth not forsake those who trust in Him; but 
those who turn to other ways, He appoints to punish- 
ment and suffering " — (cap. xi.). The connection of 
words and thoughts appears to show that 2 Pet. ii. 6-9* 
was in the writer's mind. In the time after Eusebius, 
but little doubt was expressed as to this Epistle, although 
the points of difference in the style were perceived. 
As to this, let it be observed that the subject con- 
tinually forms the style ; no one would write a hor- 
tatory or didactic address in the same style as a stern 

* " Turning the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah into ashes, con- 
demned them with an overthrow, making them an ensample unto 
those that after should live ungodly ; and delivered just Lot. 

The Lord knoweth how to deliver the godly out of 

temptations, and to reserve the unjust unto the day of judgment, 
to be punished." 



60 HISTORIC EVIDENCE. 

rebuke. I may add that this Epistle is much more 
like St. Peter, as preaching in the Acts, than is the 
first. 

It must be observed that the express testimony of 
Firmilianus, coming as it does from Cappadocia itself, 
has the utmost importance in connection with this 
writing. If we have no proof of its having been as 
widely diffused as other books of the New Testament, 
all we have to ask is, whether we have sufficient testi- 
mony as to its existence and authorship. Internally it 
claims to be written by St. Peter, and this claim is 
confirmed by the Christians of that very region in 
whose custody it ought to have been found. 



SECOND AND THIRD EPISTLES OF JOHN. 

The second Epistle of John has as much evidence as 
so short a writing would be likely to possess : it is ex- 
pressly mentioned and cited by Irenasus (1. iii.c. 16, § 8), 
whose links of connection with that Apostle have been 
already stated ; it is also mentioned and quoted by 
Clement of Alexandria. The third Epistle of John is 
mentioned by Origen, together with the second, as 
writings about which judgments might perhaps be 
divided. Dionysius of Alexandria, however, in part 
his contemporary, speaks undoubtingly of both. — {In 
Euseb. H. E. 1. vii. 25.) 



THE APOCALYPSE. 61 

The Canon in Muratori owns at least one of these 
Epistles : in my opinion, both. From the mode in 
which Jerome speaks of these Epistles, we may conclude 
that the doubt was not as to their being really sacred 
writings, but as to which John was the author, — John 
the Apostle, or John the Presbyter, — a doubt which is 
fully met by Irenseus and the writer of the fragmentary 
canon. 

EPISTLE OF JUDE. 

We find quite sufficient early testimony to the Epistle 
of Jude, for it is mentioned in Muratori's Canon, by 
Clement of Alexandria (Peed. p. 239), and by Tertullian 
{De Cultu Fcem. i. 3). We are able, therefore, at once 
to repudiate the doubts expressed by some in the begin- 
ning of the fourth century, because of earlier evidence, 
which ascribes this Epistle to Jude, the brother of 
James. 

THE APOCALYPSE. 

Eusebius speaks of the book of Kevelation in a very 
peculiar manner — perhaps a book universally received 
— perhaps one altogether spurious. 

Not so, however, did the second century judge. 
Papias, bishop of Hierapolis, near Laodicea, the con- 
temporary of the Apostle John, received and used this 
book. — [Andreas, in Apoc.) 



62 HISTORIC EVIDENCE. 

Justin Martyr, before the middle of the second cen- 
tury, held his contention with Trypho, the Jew, at 
Ephesus, where St. John had been living thirty or 
thirty-five years before. He says that the Kevelation 
had been given to " John, one of the twelve Apostles 
of Christ." Irenseus, so closely connected as he had 
been with the immediate disciples of St. John, gives a 
similar testimony : he even tells us when St. John saw 
the Revelation, almost, he says, in his own days, about 
the end of the reign of Domitian — (1. v. c. 30, § 3). 
As to the true reading of a passage, he refers to the 
information which he had received from those who had 
known John face to face. Melito, bishop of Sardis, in 
the second century, wrote a book on the Eevelation of 
John. — {Euseb. 1. iv. 26.) All this evidence is more 
or less connected with the very region of the seven 
Churches in Asia, to whom the book was addressed. 

In Egypt we have the testimony of Clement of Alex- 
andria {Strom, pp. 207, 667), and, after him, of Origen; 
in North Africa we have Tertullian (De Press, c. 33), 
and, at a little later time, we have (at Rome, probably) 
Hippoly tus. — ( Opp. p. 1 8 .) There was thus the united 
testimony of the East and West. 

Caius, a Roman presbyter of the end of the second 
century, is said {Euseb. 1. iii. 28) to have rejected this 
book : but this could have no weight against such evi- 
dence. Dionysius of Alexandria, in the middle of the 
third century, in opposing the doctrine of the millennial 



THE APOCALYPSE. 63 

reign of Christ {Euseb. L vii. 24), chose to ascribe this 
book to John the Presbyter, and not to the Apostle : 
but still he elsewhere uses it as an authority. — {Euseb. 
1. vii. 10.) The growing opposition to Millenarianism 
led to an acquiescence in the view which regarded this 
book as non-apostolic : hence, probably, the peculiar 
language employed by Eusebius. Of course we shall 
adhere to the contemporary evidence, which ascribes 
this book to the beloved disciple, instead of following 
mere arbitrary conjectures. 

Indeed, it maybe observed, that there is perhaps no 
book of the New Testament for which we have such 
clear, ample, and numerous testimonies in the second 
century as we have in favour of the Apocalypse. And 
the more closely the witnesses were themselves con- 
nected with the Apostle John (as was the case with 
Irenseus), the more full and explicit is their testimony. 
That doubts should prevail in after ages, must have 
originated either in ignorance of the earlier testimony, 
or else from some supposed intuition as to what an 
Apostle ought to have written. The objections raised 
on the ground of internal style, etc., can weigh nothing 
against the actual evidence. It is in vain to argue, 
a priori, that St. John could not have written this book, 
when we have the evidence of several competent wit- 
nesses that he did write it. 



64 HISTORIC EVIDENCE. 



RESULTS OF EVIDENCE. 

I have now discussed all the books of the New Testa- 
merit, and to this I may add, that if we were to in- 
vestigate other remains of antiquity, we could rarely 
find one-tenth part of the evidence for works un- 
doubtedly genuine ; and even this evidence is often 
only found after intervals much greater than that from 
the Apostolic age to the end of the second century. 

Historic evidence embraces a much wider range than 
that of eye-witnesses. Thus we do not, in the slightest 
degree, doubt the facts which Bede mentions in his 
history as occurring a century and a half, or two cen- 
turies, before the time when he wrote. We conclude 
that he made due inquiries of those who could inform 
him of what had taken place before his time. A person 
who takes pains may learn much orally, on good au- 
thority, as to past events. I can well remember the 
interest with which, when a child, I listened to accounts 
of the Scotch Eebellion, in 1745, under Prince Charles 
Edward Stewart ; — and these things were told me not 
on report, but by an eye-witness. Things thus learned 
(as Irenasus says) grow with us ; so that the whole of 
that rebellion would have been a history in my mind, 
even if I had never read a word on the subject. This 
is wholly different from hearsay report : and, observe, 
that this period of 106 years is as great as that between 



EESULTS OF EVIDENCE. 65 

the Apostolic age and the time when Origen had arrived 
at man's estate. A very few lives may continue testi- 
mony for a much longer period. In the popedom 
of Sixtus V. (1585-90), was born Giovanni-Battista 
Altieri. When very old he became Pope, in 1670, 
under the name of Clement X: he died in 1676. Now, 
in March, 1846, I visited at Kome the convent of 
Santa Francesca Eomana ; the abbess of this convent 
was a princess of the Altieri family, then aged almost 
100. This abbess had known several in her own 
family, very aged of course when she was young, who 
had been acquainted with their kinsman, Pope Cle- 
ment X. In conversing with the old abbess of these 
things, it seemed as if I was transported back two 
centuries and more. Here were links of connection, 
which carried me back into the reign of Queen Eliza- 
beth. Two hundred and fifty years carry us from the 
time of St. Paul to that of Eusebius, — the extreme 
interval over which our inquiries have been extended. 

Has not, then, the requirement of the rule of evi- 
dence laid down by St. Augustine been fully met ? 
We can show that a successional series of writers, from 
the age immediately subsequent to that of the Apos- 
tles, have mentioned or used (and in general exten- 
sively) the books of the Xew Testament. And if, with 
regard to some, such as the Epistle of James and the 
second Epistle of Peter, the indications are less fre- 



6$ HISTOKIC EVIDENCE. 

quent, we have only to inquire whether they are not 
sufficient. As to the books in general, the evidence is 
so cumulative that nothing more attested is presented 
to our notice. 

I have indicated the evidence on many points with- 
out stating it at length ; this has only been, however, 
the case when the facts are unquestioned. I have 
omitted vast masses of evidence as to many of the 
books, not because it is not both good and valuable, 
but because a few unquestionable witnesses sufficed to 
prove the points. I have also passed by many state- 
ments which are often brought forward as evidence, 
because of some difficulty or doubt which may attach 
itself to these testimonies. An advocate may easily 
invalidate the force of his case, by adding weak or 
doubtful evidence to that which is beyond exception. 
Cavils may be raised against what is weak, which will 
undermine, in the thoughts of others, that which is 
strong. Harm has often been done to Christian evi- 
dence by referring to writers for that which their 
works do not contain, except by doubtful interpreta- 
tions. 

Here, then, we have plain historic reasons for ac- 
cepting the twenty -seven books of the New Testament, 
as the genuine works of eight persons, Matthew, Mark, 
Luke, John, Paul, James, Peter, and Jude. But will 
this evidence apply to these books alone ? I asked, 
Why do we receive the Acts of the Apostles, and reject 



EESULTS OF EVIDENCE. 67 

the Acts of Paul and Thecla ? I have answered the 
former part of the inquiry ; I will now briefly reply to 
the second. — Because the Acts of Paul and Thecla, 
though written by an Asiatic presbyter, who had 
known Paul, was never received by contemporary 
Christians, and those of the age immediately subse- 
quent, as an authentic history : and further, as we 
learn from Tertullian and Jerome, the author of the 
book was excluded by the Apostle John from his 
office of presbyter, for having written it.* 

And as to other early writings, though we may find, 
occasionally, one or two who use them and cite them, 
yet this is the rare exception ; it is as much a matter 
of individual opinion, as it is when we now find a Pro- 
testant who believes in the divine authority of some 
book of the Apocrypha. 

But if this be the evidence in favour of the New 
Testament books, what is that which can be brought 
to meet it ? Should we not hear both sides ? There 



* This strange book, " The Acts of Paul and Thecla," is one 
of the earliest of the apocryphal writings of Christians (or 
nominal Christians) which has come down to us. It has, pro- 
bably, been altered by additions and omissions, but substantially 
it appears to be the original work of the first century. It has 
hitherto been known only in the very corrupt text published by 
Grabe : Prof. Tischendorf has just edited it, far more correctly, 
from three MSS. in the Bibliotheque du Eoi at Paris, in his 
" Acta Apostolorum Apocrypha." 



68 HISTORIC EVIDENCE. 

IS NO COUNTER EVIDENCE WHATSOEVER. Surmises 

and hinted doubts are all that can be brought to meet 
the united testimony of the early Christian Church, 
scattered in many regions, yet testifying to the trans- 
mission of the same books. But might not this com- 
mon testimony be only a tradition ? If tradition be 
used in an indefinite sense, then I say, certainly not. 
For this testimony goes back so far as to exclude the 
lapse of time needful to give birth to indefinite tradi- 
tion. And, besides, the tradition of something to be 
propagated by mere oral report, is wholly different 
from the account which is received relative to a monu- 
ment inscribed with a record, or a book which claims 
(as do St. Paul's Epistles) to be -written by any well- 
known individual. The received account then be- 
comes a sort of public consent to the recorded inscrip- 
tion, whatever it be. 

Those who seek to invalidate evidence by means of 
surmises, represent ordinary minds as incapable of 
nicely balancing such points. They say that without 
certain habits of study and mental training we cannot 
do this. But is the allegation true ? Can it be applied 
generally ? Certainly we so act as if we thought that 
minds in general are capable of appreciating evidence, 
when placed before them intelligibly. We do not 
seek for profound scholars, or men of most acute intel- 
lect, as if the facts in question in judicial inquiries 
could only be determined by such. And though we 



EESULTS OF EVIDENCE. 69 

sometimes find a brainless juryman, incapable of com- 
prehending evidence, yet this does not prevent our 
considering that men in general are competent to 
weigh testimony to facts. Mental training and ex- 
perience of a particular kind are certainly necessary to 
enable any one so to investigate facts, and to arrange 
the evidence on which they rest, as to present them 
intelligibly before others, but this is so done for the 
very purpose of putting them in possession of the evi- 
dence which enables them to grasp the facts as such. 

It has been said that the investigation of Christian 
evidences is on the whole unsatisfactory, because the 
point to which it is intended to lead the inquiry is 
known beforehand. This objection is very much in 
accordance with the habit of mind which loves a con- 
siderable degree of uncertainty, and which wishes to 
make the first elements of truth a mere field for specu- 
lation. 

But if this, objection be good, will it not apply to 
other subjects also? For instance, in mathematical 
studies we know very well as soon as a theorem is 
enunciated ichat the point is which the teacher intends 
to prove. We are not instructed how to demonstrate 
that the three angles of a triangle are equal to two 
right angles, in order that this should afterwards be in 
our minds a debatable question, but we learn the 
demonstration that this may thenceforth be held as an 
established and unquestionable fact. Just so is it as to 



70 HISTORIC EVIDENCE. 

the evidence for the records of our religion. We do 
not prove the genuineness of the New Testament books 
on any grounds of mere opinion, so that what seems 
established to-day may be overturned to-morrow, but 
we demonstrate it by evidence, which loses no part of 
its value by lapse of time, any more than time can 
weaken the force of a mathematical demonstration. 



EVIDENCE FROM THE CHANNELS OF 
TRANSMISSION. 

If we wish to find the records of a corporate body, 
we should seek for them in the custody of that cor- 
poration itself : if found there, the records may speak 
for themselves as to the authority which may attach to 
them. And thus it is with regard to the Scriptures : 
the Old Testament was given to the Jews, and they 
have transmitted it to us ; the New Testament was 
given to the Christian community, and they have 
delivered it on even to our days ; and the early writers 
of the Church have given us sufficient attestation that 
the books which we have are the same which they had 
from the beginning. Thus do we receive the Scrip- 
tures from what might formally be considered the 
proper custody, even if the early specific evidence had 
been less strong. 

I was present, about twenty years ago, at an investi- 



EVIDENCE FROM TRANSMISSION. 71 

gation, in wliich a corporate body found it needful to 
produce the charter which gave them a certain extent 
of jurisdiction. A document was produced ; — on ex- 
amination it was seen that it was not the original 
charter, but it was (as it professed to be) a transcript 
which had been made 550 years before. This tran- 
script had been admitted in the reign of James II. as 
secondary evidence of what the contents of the original 
charter had been. But when the document was read, 
it showed that the corporation, who brought it for- 
ward, had habitually acted in contravention of almost 
all its provisions. They had enforced dues and tolls 
in defiance of its limitations. Its production thus con- 
demned them so thoroughly, that they could never 
again establish their claims to these tolls. No one, cer- 
tainly, could, after this, suspect that the document — 
mere transcript as it was — was anything contrived by 
the corporation : its genuineness was proved even by 
the testimony which it bore against those who brought 
it forward. 

Thus has it been with regard to the Old Testament 
and the Jews, and the New Testament and the 
Church. Each is a witness against the collective body 
which has transmitted it. In each case we have not 
the original documents, but only transcripts ; and in 
each the transmission is confirmed by the contents of 
the documents. Just as the production of the charter, 
to which I referred, condemned the corporation which 



72 HISTORIC EVIDENCE. 

relied on it, so does the Old Testament condemn the 
Jews, and the New Testament the practical and doc- 
trinal condition for ages of the Churches that trans- 
mitted it. They affirm its divine authority ; and the 
testimony which it bears against them is such, that we 
cannot suppose it possible that they would assert this 
on any grounds but those of believing this to be the 
truth. 

In bringing forward witnesses to the authorship and 
transmission of the New Testament books, I confined 
myself to the earlier centuries : if this period gives us 
satisfactory evidence, we need only inquire further how 
these books have been transmitted from the fourth 
century and onward. 

And here let me remark, that many a document is 
presented to us without any array of extrinsic evi- 
dence. A MS. is found which shows that the book 
has some antiquity. The internal character of the 
book agrees with the age of the alleged author, and 
perhaps the whole scope shows that it is an ancient 
production. Thus, a MS. written in the middle ages, 
and now preserved in the Bibliotheque du Roi at 
Paris, has been published this year [1851] at Oxford : 
I know the MS. well; and when M. Emmanuel Miller, 
of Paris, was copying it for the press, I examined with 
him several of the passages. Now, the work contained 
in this MS. belongs undoubtedly to the early part of the 
third century of our era ; critics are not agreed as to the 



EVIDENCE FKOM TRANSMISSION. 73 

author, but the events to which allusion is made, and 
the heretical doctrines attacked, are rightly considered 
to be sufficient evidence as to when the author lived. 
And so, too, many ancient records may be brought to 
light which we feel that we can confidently use as 
historical data. Of what value, otherwise, would be 
the Assyrian records discovered of late at Nineveh ? 
The circumstances of the discovery and transmission 
are judged to be a sufficient warrant in this case, as 
well as in that of the Arundelian Marbles, and in other 
instances. 

The transmission of the New Testament books to 
our times, has been accompanied by circumstances of 
a far more confirming character. Ancient books have 
come down to us through MSS. either in the language 
in which they were originally written, or in transla- 
tions, or in both. The latter case is true of the New 
Testament. There now exist MSS. in the original 
Greek of the New Testament books, of every age, 
from the fourth century inclusive, to the time when 
they were printed. This is the fullest guarantee to us 
that these are the identical books to which the chain 
of witnesses, that I adduced, bear testimony. The 
MSS., also, are of importance in the evidence that 
they bear in favour of those books which Eusebius 
describes as doubted by some ; — for we find no MS. 
containing a collection of Epistles in which those are 
rejected which some then controverted. But besides 



74 HISTOEIC EVIDENCE. 

MSS. we have versions : — of these, some, such as the 
Syriac and old Latin, were made (as is almost certain) 
in the second century ; while in or before the fourth cen- 
tury, there were formed Egyptian versions in the two 
dialects of upper and lower Egypt, as well as a Gothic 
translation, and a new one into Latin. Others, such 
as the iEthiopic and Armenian, were made in a period 
immediately subsequent. Of the Gothic version we 
possess but a part ; and of the rest all, except the old 
Syriac, are witnesses for all our New Testament books. 

There is not such a mass of transmissional evidence 
in favour of any classical work. The existing MSS. of 
Herodotus and Thucydides are modern enough when 
compared with some of those of the New Testament. 

Thus every country, into the language of which the 
New Testament books were translated in early times, 
is a witness to us of their transmission. 

CLAB1S OF ROME. 

But the Church of Kome tells us, " You received 
the New Testament through our Church ; it is only 
through us that you know its genuineness ; you admit 
our evidence as to what is of divine authority, and 
therefore you must own that we have the right to 
declare to you what God teaches in the Scripture." 

These are high-sounding claims. But, before I 
question one single fact contained in them, there is a 



CLAIMS OF EOME. 75 

fallacy to be pointed out, which deprives the claim of 
all its force. 

Rome begs the question as to a very important 
principle. A plain statement of the case shows this — 

" He who transmits an authoritative document pos- 
sesses the right to interpret it. 

" Rome has transmitted the Scripture to you. 

" Therefore, Rome possesses the right to interpret it 
to you." 

It is only by tacitly assuming the extravagant pre- 
mise, that the Romish argument has a semblance of 
force. 

Similarly we might conclude that the corporation, 
to which I referred just now, had the right to explain 
its charter as it pleased, — that the postman has the 
right of expounding to us the letters which he delivers, 
— and that the constable possesses the privilege of 
explaining the meaning of the magistrate's summons. 

This principle, if true, would justify the Jews in 
their explanations of the Old Testament ; so that we 
must receive as authoritative all that is taught in their 
traditions — the Mishnah and Gemara — in spite of 
what our Lord says to them, " Full well ye reject the 
commandment of God, that ye may keep your own 
tradition." 

But further, it is not true that we receive the Scrip- 
tures through the Church of Rome alone. 

In the witnesses of the first three centuries you may 



76 , HISTORIC EVIDENCE. 

remember that none, except Clement of Eome, were 
bishops of that place ; — so that Eomanists can claim 
not one of tliese witnesses, besides, as a Pope : and as 
to this Clement, — the name of Pope but ill befits him 
when he pretends no commission to write authorita- 
tively, — he argues instead of dogmatising ; and he 
shows such proofs of human infirmity as must be 
rather mortifying to an upholder of papal claims : — 
he even in his simplicity (for a good simple soul he 
seems to have been) refers to the story of the phoenix 
as a fact in natural history. Other witnesses supply us 
with not a little incidental testimony against Romish 
claims. 

But besides Rome as a channel, we also receive the 
Scriptures through the Churches of other lands. The 
Latin version of the Scriptures was diffused, long be- 
fore papal claims were advanced, through Italy, North 
Africa, Gaul, the Spanish Peninsula, and Britain. 
The Oriental Churches have handed down each its 
own version ; and for the original Greek text we have 
to thank the Greek Church. 

Thus, all these have been so many separate and con- 
senting channels of transmission. So true is it, as 
defined by our reformers, that " The Church is a wit- 
ness and keeper of holy Writ." 

Thoroughly do I repudiate the idea of any infallible 
Church, congregation, or body of men : I would not 
say that in anything the Church could not err ; but o n 



TRANSMISSION TO US. 77 

the plain grounds of testimony, already given, I do 
state that, in the transmission of the New Testament 
books the Church hath not erred. 



TRANSMISSION OF THE NEW TESTAMENT 

TO US. 

ENGLISH VERSIONS. 

To ourselves, in this country, the Scriptures have 
come through the medium of translations. The ancient 
British Church appears, in common with all the West, 
to have used the Latin version, which was then 
thoroughly understood wherever there was found any 
mental culture. But we early find proofs of vernacular 
translations. 

" In Saxon days, which we were wont to call 
Ancient " 

no restriction on such versions was as yet known. — 
Pope Gregory the Great, who sent Augustine the 
monk to preach to the Saxons, was an encourager of 
the reading of Scripture. One of the books which he 
transmitted, in the year 596 to Augustine, is a Psalter 
yet in existence : this has, by a more recent hand, 
been interlined with an Anglo-Saxon version of each 
Latin word. And this was the manner in which 
several of the translations into that language were 



78 HISTOEIC EVIDENCE. 

formed. The Latin was the basis ; although, by the 
appointment of Theodore of Tarsus to the archbishop- 
ric of Canterbury, and by the Greek books which he 
brought with him from Cilicia, some knowledge of 
Greek had diffused itself among us even in the seventh 
century. 

But it is to the Eeformation, in its dawning and its 
more extensive spread, that we must look, for the chan- 
nels which have brought the Scriptures to our homes 
and hearths. For this service we are especially in- 
debted to three men, John Wycliffe, William Tyndale, 
and Miles Coverdale — three men whose memory every 
Christian heart amongst us ought to esteem very highly 
in love for their works' sake. Even if English ver- 
sions of Scripture previously existed, it was John 
Wycliffe, sometime Master of Baliol College, Oxford, 
who first set forth the holy Scripture for the instruc- 
tion of the people in the truth of God. To this end 
he toiled with a body enfeebled by palsy, but sustained 
by the grace of Christ. 

" Of the book that had been a sealed-up book, 
He tore the clasps, that the nation, 
With eyes unbandaged might thereon look, 
And learn to read salvation. 

To the death 'twas thine to persevere, 
Though the tempest around thee rattled, 

And wherever Falsehood was lurking, there 
Thy heroic spirit battled. 



TRANSMISSION TO US. 79 

And though thy bones from the grave were torn, 

Long after thy life was ended, 
The sound of thy words, to times unborn, 

Like a trumpet-call, descended. 

A light was struck — a light which showed 

How hideous were Error's features, 
And how perverted the law, bestowed 

By heaven to guide its creatures. 

At first for that spark, amidst the dark, 

The friar his fear dissembled ; 
But soon at the fame of Wycliffe's name 

The throne of St. Peter trembled." 

David M. Moir. (A.) 

Wycliffe's career might have been stopped by domi- 
nant Church influence, had not the Papacy sought to 
strengthen itself in England by taking Oxford into its 
own hands, and separating that University from the 
control of the bishop of Lincoln (in whose diocese it 
then was), and from the metropolitan jurisdiction of 
the archbishop of the province. At this very time 
occurred the schism of the Papacy, and thus the two 
Popes — one at Kome, and the other at Avignon — 
were more occupied in opposing each other, than in 
destroying an English heretic. 

Widely was Wycliffe's version of the Scriptures cir- 
culated. Many of the noble copies of this translation, 
which still exist, were probably written for the families 
of distinction (whose number was not inconsiderable) 



80 HISTORIC EVIDENCE. 

who valued the possession of the word of God in their 
own tongue. The most interesting copies, however, are 
those of a very small size, containing each, perhaps, 
one or two New Testament books, which were eagerly 
obtained by the poor who could purchase no more. 

The spread of light troubled those who upheld 
darkness. Strenuous efforts were made to suppress 
the Scriptures in English, and thus to keep down the 
Eeformation in England, by the same policy as once 
had been used by Diocletian. 

In 1408 archbishop Arundel issued his famous con- 
stitution, condemnatory of all who should possess the 
Scriptures in English, in a translation made in or since 
the days of John Wycliffe. This same archbishop 
was the first papal persecutor in our land, who took 
the lives of the servants of Christ. From the time of 
this constitution many suffered simply for the posses- 
sion of a book of Scripture : they were burned with 
the Scripture tied to their necks. What a testimony 
for them and against their oppressors ! 

Others were punished in various ways. In the 
town of Burford, in Oxfordshire, there stands a market 
cross, memorable in the days of the Lollards. By that 
cross not a few were placed one by one, and after their 
necks had been bound by a napkin to the stone shaft 
they were branded on the cheek with a hot iron 
This was often done in the latter days of Lollardism 
just before the Eeformation was about to shine forth, 



TRANSMISSION TO US. 81 

And this was for no crime save the possession of Scrip- 
ture. I have stood by that cross and meditated on 
these things. It tells, indeed, 

" A tale what England once hath borne, what England yet 
might bear." 

But the providence of God was designing a wider 
diffusion of the Scriptures in our land. William 
Tyndale (whom old Foxe terms " the Apostle of 
England in these our later times") gave forth the 
New Testament, in print, and that not rendered from 
the Latin, but from the original Greek. 

The invention of printing, and the spread of Greek 
learning, effected many changes. Erasmus sojourned 
at Cambridge, and taught Greek, while Tyndale had 
removed thither from Magdalene Hall, Oxford. A 
few years later, a greater service was rendered by 
Erasmus, when in 1516 he gave forth, at Basle, the 
first edition of the Greek New Testament that ever 
was published in print. Much as we may lament the 
many weaknesses of Erasmus, let us be thankful for 
his great services! A year or two after, this Greek 
Testament found its way to Cambridge, and it was 
there studied to some purpose ; so that while the 
Eeformation in Germany was progressing, there was 
an opposition to Komanism aroused at Cambridge 
through the study of Scripture. This extended itself 
there so much, that it was said that every one of 
Gonville Hall (now better known as Caius College) 



82 HISTOEIC EVIDENCE. 

" smelt of the gridiron"; that is, as if he ought to be 
burned as a heretic. William Tyndale left England, 
and soon sent to his native land his translated New 
Testament. The Eomish authorities sought to exclude 
the light by collecting and burning all the copies; — 
and they seemed to have been almost successful. God, 
however, had other purposes. Tyndale went on with 
his work of translation ; — but before much of the Old 
Testament had been printed, he was seized, and con- 
demned to lay down his life as a martyr for Christ. 

Miles Coverdale (bishop of Exeter, in the reign of 
Edward VI.) took up the work in good earnest. He 
tells us that he was urged on to it at Tyndale's arrest 
in the latter part of 1534 :* and laboriously must he 

* Coverdale says two things ; — 1st (in 1535), that he took up 
the work on Tyndale's arrest (November 1534) ; — and, 2nd (in 
the preface to his reprinted Bible, 1550), that he began his trans- 
lation, "anno 1534." Some modern writers, who profess to 
know a great deal about the history of the English Bible, have 
had the temerity to say that those who assert this are guilty of 
gross extravagance. It would be well if such writers would 
acquaint themselves with CoverdaWs own statements. Some 
choose to decry Coverdale' s version as much as possible, affirm- 
ing that he did not translate the Old Testament from the 
Hebrew : it is certain that he used all critical aids in his power, 
and that he worked with intense speed ; but if those who decry 
his version were better acquainted with it, they would learn that 
it is based on the Hebrew, and that even the Hebrew edition 
which he used can be pointed out. 



ROME AS A KEEPER OF HOLY WRIT. S3 

have toiled — for, on the 4th of October, 1535, the trans- 
lated and printed volume of the entire holy Scripture 
was completed. There were yet many storms before 
England had the unhindered use of the word of God ; 
but from the day of the accession of Queen Elizabeth, 
November 17, 1558, there has not been, in this land, 
any restriction on the use of holy Scripture in our 
tongue. Well might the 17th of November be kept, 
as long it was, as a kind of national holyday ! 



ROME AS A KEEPER OF HOLY WRIT. 

Our reformers, as I have already remarked, stated 
the Church to be a keeper of holy Writ. The Church 
of Rome has shown herself to be so in a peculiar 
sense. She has made herself such a keeper, as if the 
Scripture had been a criminal, or a dangerous lunatic. 
She has kept it away from the people. 

I referred just now to MSS., as the principal channels 
through which Scripture has come down to us. Of 
the MSS., the most ancient and important is one pre- 
served in Rome, in the Vatican library. The value of 
ancient MSS. is great; for it is by comparing them 
that we are able to correct the text, so as to make it 
the more exactly represent the work as originally 
written. I do not mean to say that the common text 
is not tolerably accurate, but still the more precious a 
work is, the more ought we to desire to possess its read- 



84 HISTOKIC EVIDENCE. 

ings as correctly as possible. To collate tliis Vatican 
MS. was trie object which led me to Rome six years 
ago. I took with me such introductions as seemed 
most fitting to accomplish the end I had in view : — 
but no ! — no facility could be afforded for anything that 
aided to edit the text of Scripture ; and I could only 
meet with promises and delays, — promises which came 
to nothing, and delays of a most wearying kind. 
Cardinal Lambruschini, then at the head of affairs, and 
holding the office of " Apostolic Librarian," as well as 
that of Secretary of State, gave me permission to col- 
late the MS. ; and yet difficulties were thrown in my 
way at the library : — Monsignor Laureani, the primo 
custode, acted on the secret orders that he had received, 
and took no notice of the apparent permission that had 
been given. I obtained an interview with the late 
Pope (not, however, senselessly kissing the embroidered 
cross on his slipper), and he, in word, graciously gave 
me permission ; but he referred me to Mgr. Laureani, 
who was already my hindrance. And thus, after five 
months of weary waiting, I left Rome without accom- 
plishing my object. It is true that I often saw the MS., 
but they would not allow me to use it ; and they would 
not let me open it without searching my pockets, and 
depriving me of pen, ink, and paper ; and at the same 
time two prelati kept me in constant conversation in 
Latin, and if I looked at a passage too long, they would 
snatch the book out of my hand. So foolishly and 



ROME AS A KEEPER OF HOLY WRIT. 85 

meaninglessly did the papal authorities seek to keep 
this precious MS. to themselves. 

All the circumstances of the transmission of Scripture 
to us in our tongue, show how Rome has kept it back 
from us as much as possible ; and this is what she still 
does in countries where she has sway, and this she 
would do here if she could. 

By the system of the confessional, the priests of 
Kome find out who possess the Scriptures in their own 
tongue, and these are made to endure persecutions like 
to those of Diocletian. That Rome continues her hos- 
tility to Scripture, witness the persecutions now carry- 
ing on in Tuscany — where every family tie is broken 
to obtain accusations ; — witness the encyclical letter of 
the present Pope, and the public burning of Bibles in 
the square of the capitol under his predecessor. But 
why need I turn to things in distant lands, when the 
spirit of Rome showed itself in this very town, and in 
this very year, by the endeavour which the popish 
priesthood made to prevent Christian ladies from read- 
ing the English Bible to emigrants ? And on what 
ground could they object to this ? Why, forsooth, 
because there might be Romanists present, and we must 
respect their consciences. As well might we be for- 
bidden to preach the Gospel of Christ in our churches 
and chapels, because it scandalises Romish consciences : 
— no Romanist is present except from free choice, and 
that is enough. 



86 HISTORIC EVIDENCE. 

But why do not the Komanists respect our consci- 
ences ? They are unrestricted here as to their worship, 
— why do they impose restrictions on us when abroad? 
They seem to think it a wondrous stretch of liberality 
that they allow an English church outside the walls of 
Rome. But this, after all, is only a kind of loft of no 
very desirable description ; and the contempt implied 
in its being outside the walls is not little. But do they 
interfere with what is done there ? Do they respect 
conscience ? About seven years ago, Dean Murray, 
of Ardagh in Ireland (who was known in this town to 
many eleven years ago), was at Eome : he preached in 
the English church, but in the third sermon he used 
the word " tran substantiation " ; that was enough, — 
notice was sent that if Dean Murray preached there 
again, the place would be closed by the authorities. 
This was the account which Roman Catholics gave 
me of the affair. So much for respect paid to con- 
science. 

And yet at Rome they endeavour to mystify the sub- 
ject, as though it were not true that the ecclesiastical 
authorities wish to keep minds in ignorance. They 
tell strangers that their Sunday schools are so admirably 
attended, that there is no European capital in which 
such a proportion of the young receive primary instruc- 
tion ; and they point to large placards on the walls, 
announcing the Scriptures in Italian for sale. All this 
seems Yerj plausible, and many are deceived by it. 



ROME AS A KEEPER OF HOLY WRIT. 87 

But let us look a little below the surface. You may 
go into one of these parish schools on a Sunday after- 
noon ; you find a large number of children congregated 
in a side chapel, and you see a priest pacing up and 
down, to listen if all goes on properly. Some inquirers 
are content with this, and they go away reporting that 
they heard the children diligently occupied with their 
lessons, under the active and vigilant superintendence 
of a priest devoted to his work. But this investigation 
is not enough : you must enter the chapel itself (I have 
often done this), and there you see no books or lessons 
whatever. You see a sharp-looking girl, with a shrill 
voice and commanding manner, who acts as a sort of 
monitress, and after her the younger children repeat a 
great deal by rote. In short, the " primary instruc- 
tion," of which so much is said, does not include 
learning to read. Then what does it include ? is what 
you may well ask. / never found them occupied 
with anything but Litanies addressed to the Virgin 
Mary. 

But still, if the Scriptures in Italian are publicly 
announced for sale at Kome,* is it not a calumny to 
say that they withhold the Bible from the people ? 

* The Roman Catholic bishop, Milner, tells us : " Vulgar 
translations of the whole Scripture are upon sale, and open to 
every one, in Italy itself, with the express approbation of the 
Roman Pontiff." — (End of Religious Controversy, Letter xlvii. 
p. 342, 5th ed. 1824.) 



88 HISTORIC EVIDENCE. 

English visitors often asked me this. Have you read 
the placards through ? was my reply. Now, they begin 
with setting forth the importance of the edition of the 
Italian Bible ; then they say that this translation is that 
of Mgr. Martini, archbishop of Florence, in which every- 
thing is rendered in entire conformity with the doc- 
trines of Holy Church, as defined by the Council of 
Trent. (The mode in which this is done in Martini's 
translation is by altering a text here and there, so that, 
without making a general change, there is authority 
inserted for every one of the peculiar dogmas of Borne.*) 
The placard continues to say, that all is explained by 
notes taken from approved Catholic writers. And yet 
one might say, in spite of all this, a great deal of Scrip- 
ture is opened to the eyes of the Eoman people. It 
may seem so ; but, however, the notice continues to 
inform us, that all discreet Catholics may purchase who 
have the permission of their confessors, and who will 
read under their direction : this of course would make 
the permission nugatory, and so also would the price, — 

* This is the common plan in all the Romish versions : they 
are such that Protestants cannot circulate them as being the pure 
wosd of God. The passages which speak of the finished sacrifice 
of Christ receive a colouring wholly different. Thus, in the 
Roman Catholic English version we find, in Heb. x. 12, " But 
this man offering one sacrifice for sins, for ever sitteth on the 
right hand of God : " and in ch. i. 3, " making purgation of sins, 
sitteth," etc. What perversions ! 



EOME AS A WITNESS OF HOLY WKIT. 89 

for that is about twenty Koman crowns, or more than 
four guineas : this alone is a mockery when addressed 
to a population in abject poverty. I never saw a copy 
of this edition of the Bible ; for although they did not 
ask an Englishman for the written permission of a 
confessor, yet they refused to produce a copy unless I 
promised to purchase.* 

ROME AS A WITNESS OF HOLY WRIT. 

Thus is Eome a keeper of holy Writ, in the sense 
of keeping it back from the eyes of men. But I say 
further, that as a witness of holy Writ she has become 
a false witness. She allows things to go forth in which 
Scripture words are perverted to false uses. For in- 
stance, in the church of Sta. Maria Maggiore, at Flo- 
rence,^ I saw over the altar of St. Joseph the text 
" Ite ad Josephum, Gen. xli. 55" " Go unto Joseph !" 
thus applying the words of Pharaoh to the Egyptians 
to the honours which they pay to Joseph, the husband 
of Mary, whom they style the patron of the dying, 
possessed (they affirm) of the singular privilege, that 

* It was in the winter of 1845-6 that I made diligent in- 
quiries for a copy of this version of the Bible in Italian, so osten- 
tatiously advertised at Rome. I cannot find, however, that in 
the following year even the placards were exhibited at all. 

f This is a small church in the Via de' Cerretani, bearing 
the same name as the well-known Basilica on the Esquiline at 
Rome. 



90 HISTORIC EVIDENCE. 

no one who is devoted to him shall fail of having a 
happy death. This awM perversion of Scripture is 
not confined to Italy, for I saw in London, a few 
months ago, in a Eoman Catholic book-shop, a picture 
of St. Joseph, with a statement of the powers with 
which they invest him, and below this same text in 
French, " Allez a Joseph." 

At Eome, near the Vatican, stands the church of 
" our Lady, the mother of grace." In the porch is this 
inscription, " Let us come boldly unto the throne of 
Mary, that we may obtain mercy." I asked, " How 
dare you thus alter and pervert the Scripture ? " 
" Oh ! " the answer was, " this is no perversion ; it is 
only putting our Lady's name instead of the word that 
describes her : our Lord said to our Lady, No grace 
shall flow forth to any one except through thee." 

These are but specimens of the perverted use which 
Eome makes of fragments of Scripture to support her 
delusions ; and how are the people, without Bibles, to 
detect the imposture ? 

A maid-servant at Eome said to an English lady, 
who told her of the falsehood and folly of some legend 
about the Virgin Mary, " But what can we do ? we 
must believe what we are told, or else believe nothing. 
We are not allowed to have books that would teach us." 
Indeed, the Bible is to many of them a mysterious 
book. An English lady, travelling in Tuscany, after 
reading her Bible, gave it to the chambermaid to pack 



EOME AS A WITNESS OE HOLT WKIT. 91 

up with her other things. The young woman asked 
what book it was; " La parola di Dio," was the answer. 
This drew forth an expression of astonishment, " La 
parola di Dio ! e che dice ? " Happily for us, we have 
no occasion to ash, What does the word of God say ? we 
have to seek teachable spirits, that we may listen to its 
instruction. 

Where Scripture is thus withheld, what a state of 
uncertainty must rest on every mind as to what God 
has taught, and what He has not ! I may illustrate 
this: — I was once on a jury, when the counsel for 
one of the parties, with a most unaccountable mis- 
apprehension, told us that it was a very plain case, for 
the words of a certain Act of Parliament were, " It shall 
be lawful": the judge quietly corrected the statement, 
which only led to the counsel twice repeating the as- 
sertion. The judge handed us the Act of Parliament, 
saying, " Gentlemen, this is a question of fact, and 
therefore wholly within your province ; you can see 
whether the word not is in the sentence.'.' We read 
the clause, " It shall NOT be lawful," and thus saw 
that the counsel (from whatever cause) was misleading 
us. Had we not been able to refer to the Act, I am 
sure that some of the jury would have credited the 
strenuous assertions of the counsel more than the cor- 
rection of the judge. This would be our condition, had 
we not the Scripture open before us : how could we know 
whom we ought to believe as to the truth of God ? 



92 HISTORIC EVIDENCE. 

USES OF SUCH INVESTIGATION. 

It might seem to some, as if an investigation of the 
historic evidence of the authorship of the New Testa- 
ment would be of but little value in aiding our spiritual 
intelligence of its contents. This is not its direct object. 
We may be well satisfied with the proportions and 
aptitude of an edifice, without having thought much 
on the subject of its foundations. But if any question 
were raised as to its stability, we should then wish to 
be satisfied as to its foundations ; though such an in- 
quiry would not make it more commodious than 
before. 

But such investigations have a yet further use : they 
serve to connect the practical application of Scripture, 
in all its force, with the manner in which it was first 
given forth. A partially-instructed eye may gaze on 
the starry heavens, and may learn something of the 
motions of the planets : but when he sees an astronomer 
in his study busily engaged with mathematical demon- 
strations, he may ask what connection geometrical 
elements and algebraic formulae can have with the 
heavenly orbs above us. And yet every instructed 
mind must know, that it is by mathematical science 
alone that we possess that exactitude of astronomical 
knowledge which can enable any one to calculate the 
orbit of even the most distant of the planets. It was 
thus that the existence of the newly-found planet 



USES OF SUCH INVESTIGATION. 93 

Neptune was traced : mathematical science showed that 
there must be a body affecting the course in which the 
planet Herschell would otherwise have moved. Thus 
there was a close and intimate connection between the 
early mathematical studies of John Adams (studies 
which connected him with this neighbourhood, and, 
as to his instructor, with this place), and the greatest 
astronomical discovery of this century. He informed 
me, in speaking of his education, that even then it was 
its application to astronomy that gave him the interest 
which he felt in mathematics. Whatever is learned 
fundamentally, admits of wide and extensive appli- 
cation. 

This historic investigation is equally opposed to 
Eome and Kationalism. 

To the claims of Eome, we may say, we possess the 
word of God, given forth by the inspiration of the 
Holy Ghost (as she owns), which has been transmitted 
to us from the days of the Apostles ; and this Scrip- 
ture, instead of leading us to blind and superstitious 
belief in whatever Church authorities present, instructs 
.us in the grounds of our salvation through faith in the 
blood of Christ. It is remarkable how, in conducting 
this inquiry, every point of evidence supplied fresh 
testimony against Eome. To that unhappy Church 
one may, indeed, apply in another sense the words of 
Tertullian, " Let us see what it learned, — what it 
teaches"; it was taught that " whatsoever things were 



94 HISTOKIC EVIDENCE. 

written aforetime, were written for our learning, that 
we through patience and comfort of the Scriptures 
might have hope" — (Rom. xv. 4). And again, it was 
told of the revelation of the mystery now " made 
manifest, and by the Scriptures of the prophets, accord- 
ing to the commandment of the everlasting God, made 
known to all nations for the obedience of faith" — 
(xvi. 26). Alas! instead of teaching this, Eome with- 
holds the word of God, and persecutes those who 
read it. She forbids that " hope" which arises from 
the comfort of the Scriptures. 

Definite grounds of testimony are equally opposed 
to the growing evil of rationalism under its various 
forms. Some seek to meet this evil by the claims of 
Church authority : — let them rather be met by the 
authority of God in his word. Whatever would cast 
doubt or uncertainty upon Scripture, is answered by 
ihe distinct evidence which carries us back to the age 
of the Apostles. We may thus hold forth the New 
Testament, maintaining its claims, and denying that 
there are any grounds, in fact, for representing its 
origin as involved in any uncertainty at all. And 
when a rejection of the claims of Scripture is repre- 
sented as an indication of mental superiority, we need 
not be surprised — for the New Testament has told us 
that " there shall come in the last days scoffers, walk- 
ing after their own lusts, and saying, Where is the 
promise of his coming? for since the fathers fell asleep, 



USES OF SUCH INVESTIGATION. 95 

all tilings continue as they were from the beginning of 
the creation. For this they willingly are ignorant of, 
that by the word of God the heavens were of old," 
etc. It is this willing ignorance that leads minds 
astray, and of this we have been forewarned : " See- 
ing ye know these things before, beware lest ye also, 
being led away with the error of the wicked, fall from 
your own steadfastness." The Scripture has thus, here, 
and in other places, as in the 2nd Epistle to Timothy, 
and in that of Jude, warned us fully of the increasing 
evil of the last days, — a solemn truth, which ought to 
put us on our guard against those rationalistic thoughts 
which exalt man, and depreciate or cast doubt upon 
the Scripture of God. 

In conclusion, let me ask you not to be surprised if 
difficulties, as to portions of Scripture, are brought 
before you, such as you may not be prepared to 
answer. No difficulty connected with a proved fact 
can invalidate the fact itself. Objectors are pertina- 
cious in repeating the same cavils. Well did Bishop 
Home say, " Pertness and ignorance may ask a ques- 
tion in three lines, which it will cost learning and in- 
genuity thirty pages to answer ; and when this is 
done, the same question shall be triumphantly asked 
again the next year, as if nothing had ever been writ- 
ten on the subject." God has unfolded before you two 
books, — the book of Creation and the book of Revela- 



96 HISTOEIC EVIDENCE. 

tion. In creation you see testimony to the Creator, so 
that those who learn not his eternal power and God- 
head, as witnessed by the things that are made, are 
without excuse. Many difficulties might be raised as 
to points in which we do not see the wisdom and good- 
ness of God ; but these things do not shake our con- 
fidence in the testimony borne by the book of Creation. 
So, too, as to the book of Eevelation : seeming diffi- 
culties cannot invalidate its authority ; they should 
only teach us how finite are our minds, and lead us 
the more with patience and humility to seek the in- 
struction of the Holy Spirit of God, who can cause all 
seeming difficulties to vanish. " Who is wise, and he 
shall understand these things ? prudent, and he shall 
know them? for the ways of the Lord are right, and 
the just shall walk in them : but the transgressors shall 
fall therein" — (Hos. xiv. 9). 



APPENDIX. 



No. I. 

ON THE TEXT OF THE NEW TESTAMENT. 

Those who wish to cast doubt or distrust upon the records of Kevela- 
tion, have habitually represented the text of the New Testament to be 
such as is involved in entire uncertainty ; so that, in fact, we are told 
that we have no evidence by which we can show what is the true text 
of the New Testament books. 

Those who are unacquainted with the subject have not unfrequently 
been at a loss how to answer the strong statements that have been made 
on this point ; and, on the other hand, defenders have sometimes taken 
a very imperfect view of the facts of the case ; so that a brief statement 
of the whole matter will not be, I believe, unsuitable in this place ; for this 
will show that the question of the true text does not in the least affect 
the evidence to the books themselves as to their general character and 
texture ; and, also, it may make it clear to Christians that so far from 
the subject being one from which they ought to shrink, it is that which 
they should regard as peculiarly their own, and that if they reverence 
the word of > God, so far from fearing textual criticism, they ought (if 
possessed of the needed requirements and abilities) to understand and 
use it, in order to uphold the existence of the New Testament against 
those who would envelope everything relating to it in a cloud of nega- 
tions. 

Every ancient work has been transmitted to us by means of MSS. 
"We possess the original autographs of none ; so that we are indebted 
to copyists for the exemplars that have been handed down. The pro- 
cess of transcription is always one by which errors naturally creep in ; 
and thus, the oftener an ancient writing was copied, the more danger 

7 



98 APPENDIX. 

was there of departure from what the author originally wrote. Similar 
words and phrases would be substituted for others ; copyists would 
accidentally omit words or sentences, or they would insert in the 
text something which had been noted in the margin, or they would 
try to correct what they thought to be wrong : so that, while the 
general texture of a work continued the same, it might abound in slight 
alterations ; such, for the most part, as would but little affect the 
actual sense. 

Now, this has been the case with regard to the New Testament, in 
exactly the same manner as other books. Some haye thought that 
such an idea would cast a kind of reflection upon God — as if He would 
permit the perfection of Scripture to be impaired. All we need say is, 
that the fact is such; Scripture has been subject to just the same 
casualties as other books ; copyists have made mistakes (just as com- 
positors in printing may do) in transcribing Scripture, exactly the 
same as if they had been engaged on secular writings. As things are 
so, we know that G-od has permitted this to take place. 

After the invention of printing, ancient works were multiplied by 
means of the press instead of the pen : the early printers (just as the 
transcribers to whom they succeeded) took whatever copy of a work 
came first to hand ; and this, whether correct in its readings or not, 
became the basis of the first printed text. But when the increase in the 
number of books caused a similar increase of thought and attention to 
be paid to literature, the business of critical editors gradually arose. 
It was found that copies of the same work differed in many respects ; 
and hence they were compared throughout, and the variations were 
noted, — a process to which the term collation is applied. The earlier 
the MSS. of an author, the more closely do they approach, in general, 
to what he wrote ; since each successive transcriber was sure to add 
something (however little) to the amount of mistakes. The comparison, 
then, of the more ancient MSS. together shows how much or how little 
of the text of an author can be considered as uncertain, and also how 
great or how little (as a balance of probabilities) the uncertainty may 
be, and also how far the sense is affected by such variations. 

So far from a recurrence to ancient readings being considered to cast 
doubt on ancient authors, which were at first printed from later MSS., 
the reverse is notoriously the fact ; for it is thus that critical editors 
have rejected erroneous readings which were found in early editions, 



APPENDIX. 99 

and hence they are able to give forth the authors of antiquity far more 
genuine in condition. 

With regard to the New Testament, it is in vain for an objector to 
say, " Such a MS. reads such a passage differently," or, " Such copies omit 
or add such and such words " : for unless the objector has some know- 
ledge of ordinary textual criticism, and unless those whom he addresses 
have at least some apprehension of what are the grounds of difficulty, 
the whole argument, as bearing on the authenticity of Scripture * has 
as little meaning as if one sought to prove that one of the heavenly 
bodies does not exist, because of some observed variation in its orbit. 
The true readings of any ancient book must always be discussed as an 
inquiry wholly distinct from that of the external evidence to its 
genuineness. Because a planet exists, an astronomer may calculate its 
orbit ; because we have evidence that St. Paul wrote an Epistle to the 
E-omans, and that Epistle has come down to us in ancient copies, we 
may examine the copies in order to learn what is the true text. 

The New Testament, like all other books, was first printed from such 
MSS. as came first to hand ; they were modern copies, and from these 
the common text has proceeded. Now, while other ancient works in 
general have been for many years published in texts far more correct 
than those that proceeded from the first printers, the Greek New Testa- 
ment long remained (and as far as England is concerned may be said 
still to remain) almost unimproved. And repeatedly have attempts to 
show how it might be rendered more critically correct, called forth 
denunciations on the part of those whose defence of revealed truth was 



* !N"o uncertainty, as to the reading of present copies, can affect the original 
authority of a document : it is not customary to confound such things. Thus, 
we know that the authority of an Act of Parliament is derived from the Legisla- 
ture which enacts it, and that this is not impaired even if such an Act be copied 
inaccurately : we use proper means for knowing that we have correct copies. 
It is true, that for convenience' sake, the Law declares that the copy of an Act, 
as printed by the Queen's printer, shall be taken as possessing the same autho- 
rity as the original Act engrossed on parchment ; but even this does not pre- 
vent examination in case of error. Thus, a year or two ago, in the " Health 
of Towns Act," it was found that, by a single erratum, the Queen's printers had 
excluded graduates of the University of Edinburgh from being appointed as 
medical officers under it; the mistake was soon discovered, and the Queen's 
printers issued a re-impression of the Act. This is just a case in which a judg- 
ment would have to be formed as to the true reading of a document whose 
authority was not at all in question. 



100 APPENDIX. 

characterised by more of zeal than knowledge. If such defenders had 
interfered with Bible printing, and if they had denounced the press- 
correctors, who were engaged in rectifying the errors of the composi- 
tors, their proceedings would have shown an equal amount of 
intelligence. 

And it was the inconsiderate zeal of these defenders, who attacked 
textual criticism in order to uphold the New Testament, that put this 
weapon into the hands of objectors. Such were able to say, " The text 
of your sacred books is rendered utterly doubtful by various readings "; 
and they were able to cite the language which had been applied to 
critics, by those who little thought what an use might be made of their 
words. If the objectors really used this argument as supposing that it 
was forcible, then they must have been as unacquainted with the 
whole subject of the readings of ancient works, as were the too zealous 
defenders from whom they borrowed it. 

It is difficult to explain the subject of the text of the New Testament 
in such a manner as not to be misunderstood. On the one hand, 
it may seem as if the variation of copies is so great, that it can 
hardly be overstated ; on the other hand, this variation is often spoken 
of as though it were of comparatively little importance ; — a3 though, in 
fact, it were some theoretic point, rather than one of any practical 
value.* I wish, if possible, to guard against both these errors. As to 
the first, it may, I believe, be plainly said, that the New Testament has 
come down to us with about the same amount of transcriptural injury 
as other ancient works ; and as to the second, I shall not be supposed 

* This tendency has often exhibited itself in English minds. Writers have 
spoken of MSS. as if they were, in general, pretty correct, and as if no doctrinal 
statement, and no fact stood differently in any MS. whatever : this misappre- 
hension is, indeed, most strange ; it is applying the general evidence to the 
general text to all the particular parts of which that evidence is composed. "We 
might as well confound the arch with the single stones of which it is formed, 
and thus affirm that each of them safely spans the stream. The " Edinburgh 
Eeview," Kb. 191 (page 5, note), goes so far as to say, "In point of fact, the 
doctrines of the English Church would not be affected even if the worst read- 
ings of the worst MS. were in every case to be purposely adopted." To this 
strong statement, I briefly reply, that MSS. contain mistakes of quite as much 
doctrinal importance as that in the printed Bible, which omitted " not" in the 
seventh Commandment ; or that which read in 1 Cor. vi. 9, " EJnow ye not that 
the unrighteous shall inherit the kingdom of God ?" 



APPENDIX. 101 

to regard the textual criticism of the New Testament as of small 
moment by those who are aware, that for years the business of my life 
has been (and still is) the collation of ancient MSS. and versions of the 
New Testament, in order to publish a critical edition. 

If, then, it be said that transcribers have so altered the books of the 
New Testament that they are wholly different from what they once 
were, — if it be alleged that the doctrines laid down in it have been 
changed by design or by ignorance,— the assertion may be met with a 
direct negative. We may point to the ancient MSS. of different coun- 
tries in proof that the substantial texture of the books has not been 
tampered with by any fraud ; we may turn to the ancient versions as 
witnesses of the same facts. And, as to the observed various readings, 
we may show that they commonly relate to the order of words, to 
synonymous expressions, and the like. When greater variations, such 
as the insertion or the non-insertion of sentences, are objected, then we 
must say, " Well, it is a question to be determined, not by previously- 
formed opinions, but by evidence ; let us consult the MSS. and ver- 
sions ; let us see if any light is thrown on the point from the citations 
of early writers." If, then, we find that the words are not found in the 
oldest MSS., if they are equally excluded from the versions, and if the 
early writers do not cite them, then of course we must know that this 
is not a debatable point, but that we possess that certainty which clear 
lines of distinct evidence can give. An objector cannot say that he has 
thus extruded a doctrine from the New Testament, for there is not a 
single point of dogmatic teaching which rests merely on any one pas- 
sage of doubtful authenticity, or such as is infirm as to evidence. 

In cases in which authorities differ, their testimony must be 
balanced ; and if we cannot arrive at absolute certainty, we shall pro- 
bably be able to say that all the range of doubt lies within somewhat 
narrow limits. We shall thus learn not to magnify the importance of 
New Testament variations. 

We must not forget that even works written since the invention of 
printing are not necessarily certain as to their text : — how remarkably 
is this the case as to much of the English poetry of two centuries and 
a half ago ! and yet who would say that this affected the general com- 
plexion of the poems ? One might have thought that doctrinal state- 



102 APPENDIX. 

ments would have been guarded with "peculiar care, and yet it is not 
particularly easy to determine the genuine text of the Augsburg Con- 
fession, of the Thirty-nine Articles, or of the Documents of the Coun- 
cil of Trent. It is not that there is any uncertainty as to the doctrines 
laid down. As to the Augsburg Confession, it cannot be said that the 
true text had ever been published till a very few years ago ; while, as to 
its definitions of doctrine, there had not been the slightest doubt or 
uncertainty. 

Those who exaggerate the magnitude of various readings in the New 
Testament, commonly attach a vast importance to a few passages : 
they have, perhaps, heard that 1 John v. 7, is spurious;* they, there- 
fore, imagine that the rejection of this passage impugns the doctrine of 
the Trinity — as if that doctrine had not been maintained by those that 
never heard of this verse, absent as it is from every Creek MS. older 
than the 16th century, and from every ancient MS. of every ancient 
version : — or, perhaps, they charge the maintainers of orthodox truth 
with fraud ; because the passage acquired a place in the printed text, 
not knowing (or else concealing the fact) that its place there was 
objected to from the first. 

It is, thus, by resting on a few points, that an effect is produced, as 
though something wide-spread and universal could be brought forward, 
which would cast doubt or uncertainty over the whole of Scripture. 
This has, I believe, produced a contrary tone of mind in this country 
on the part of upholders of Christian truth : they have often either 
shunned the subject, or else they have reduced its magnitude and im- 
portance as much as possible. Instead of this, they ought to have 
taken the facts as they are : the question is not whether the various 
readings in the New Testament are many and great, but whether 
(knowing their existence) we will weigh the evidence, as if we had 
to do with any other ancient work, and see what the honest result 
may be. 

* It is, in fact, most of the 7th, and a few words of the 8th, verse that are 
not supported by any evidence : " For there are three that bear record [in hea- 
ven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost ; and these three are one. 
And there are three that bear witness in earth] , the Spirit, and the water, and 
the blood, and these three agree in one." The words in brackets have no 
ancient authority whatever ; and they were equally rejected by Luther, and by 
our Eeformers in this country. They seem to have originated in a marginal 
note in some Latin copies. 



APPENDIX. 103 

The consequence of the subject having been avoided in this country, 
has been, that passages have been habitually quoted for what they do 
not contain, if read properly;* difficulties have been explained which 
only exist in the readings of later copies ;f and if a writer spoke of the 
critical reasons for not believing in the genuineness of a passage, he 
was sure (unless he had veiled his words in Latin) to be charged by 
some with want of reverence for the word of God ; — a charge which 
only showed the well-intentioned ignorance of those who made it.£ 

Some have shunned textual criticism as though it were opposed, in 
some mysterious manner, to orthodox truth; in this way they have 
given a vantage-ground to heterodoxy. It is quite true that some few 
passages which bear on the proper Godhead of Christ, are read differ- 
ently in the best critical documents ; but what then ? These passages 
are not the only proofs of that cardinal doctrine ; and, further, they 
were not at all the grounds on which it was held fast in the midst of 



* Thus, in discussions on Baptism, we still, sometimes, find those who cite the 
words of Philip and the Ethiopian, Acts viii. 37, " And Philip said, If thou 
believest with all thine heart, thou mayest. And he answered, and said, I 
believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God." This appears to be done in entire 
unconsciousness, that no part of this Terse is given in critical texts. 

t In Acts xiii. 19, 20, in our version, St. Paul says, " And when he had 
destroyed seven nations in the land of Chanaan, he divided their land to them 
by lot : and after that, he gave unto them judges, about the space of four hun- 
dred and fifty years, until Samuel the prophet." All kinds of endeavours have 
been made to reconcile this term of four hundred and fifty years with other 
Scripture dates ; it has furnished enough material for whole volumes, and this 
period is still called "the computation of St. Paul," in the title of Sir Henry 
Ellis's new edition of " Blair's Chronological and Historical Tables." Wow, in 
the' most ancient copies, the period of four hundred and fifty years stands in 
quite a different connection : "JEe destroyed seven nations in the land of 
Chanaan, and gave them their land by lot about four hundred and fifty years ; 
and afterwards he gave unto them judges," etc. Attention ought to have been 
paid to this reading, instead of its being wasted on one more recent. 

% Dr. Eouth (" Keliquise Saerse," i. p. 39) discusses the question, whether the 
narration contained in the common text of John viii. 1 — 12, is the same as 
the history of a woman accused before our Lord of many crimes, and he con- 
cludes thus: — "Evidenter constat, etiamsi suspecta ha?c evangelii pericope 
eadem esse censeatur atque historia Papiana, nondum earn codici Nbvi Testa- 
menti tempore Eusebii insertam fuisse." This remark, in English, that 
John viii. 1 — 11, was not yet inserted in the New Testament in the time of 
Eusebius, though perfectly true, would have been sure to have called forth 
severe remark. Critics who state evidence, are treated as if they ought to have 
invented counter-evidence. 



104 APPENDIX. 

the early controversies ; for there are quite enough passages free from 
all difference of reading in which it is set forth. It might also be well 
for those who shun textual criticism on such grounds, to know, that 
MS. authorities will give quite as much as they take away ; so that if 
any fear the application of sound principles, it should be those who 
disapprove of the doctrines taught in the New Testament in its com- 
mon text ; for they will find the same doctrines supported, not by a 
mere traditional text bearing date since the introduction of printing, 
but by MSS., versions, and ancient citations, which lead us back to the 
early centuries. 

In defending the common printed text, as such, against the just 
demands of criticism, advocates have so acted as would weaken all 
Christian evidence, if the defence were accepted as legitimate ; for they 
have confounded the proofs in favour of that which is infirm with the 
evidence which is absolute in upholding that which is certainly ge- 
nuine : in bringing all to the same level, it has been impossible really 
to elevate what rests on no just basis, and thus all has been lowered to 
the same ground of uncertainty, or even worse. And, then, when 
attempts have been made to use the condition of the text as an argu- 
ment against Revelation, dogmatic assertions have been made, such as 
would not really meet the difficulty ; and there has been no firm foot- 
ing against those who would represent the text as wholly precarious 
and uncertain, and who therefore would select whatever readings they 
chose, and give the sacred documents whatever complexion they could, 
so far as they were supported by any evidence, good or bad. 

And yet this country was once the locality in which Biblical scho- 
lars paid particular attention to textual criticism. In the latter half of 
the seventeenth century, and the former half of the eighteenth, much 
was done amongst us ; but the remembrance of this seemed to be the 
only thing left, while a kind of dogmatic ignorance usurped the place 
which ought to have been held by intelligent and sober criticism. It 
is not my present concern to detail the history of the application of 
criticism to the New Testament ; suffice it to say, that such labours 
were carried on in other countries, while but few amongst us — such as 
Principal Campbell of Aberdeen, and Professor White of Oxford — 
understood or valued what was accomplished. 

G-riesbach had, on a system of his own, restored the ancient readings 



APPENDIX. 105 

of several passages : this was felt to be an innovation ; so that when 
Professor Scholz of Bonn published the first volume of his Greek 
Testament, in 1830, it was hailed, in this country, by many, as an im- 
portant defence of the common, later, text. The leading principle of 
Scholz is to follow the mass of later MSS., instead of the few* very 
ancient documents which have come down to us. If this principle of 
following the many recent copies, instead of the/ew ancient, be sound, 
then let us apply it to printed books ; and instead of adhering to the 
readings of the few scarce copies of editions almost coeval with the 
authors, let us concede all to the authority of the mass of modem 
copies, got out, perhaps, as trade speculations by mere booksellers. 

The true principle is surely that of adherence to the ancient copies, 
irrespective of modern readings, and it is to this that New Testament 
criticism has now arrived.f Bentley laid it down, and proposed to edit 
a text thus arranged. 

The first who acted on it fully was my late friend, Dr. Lachmann of 
Berlin : he published the text of the New Testament, founded on 
ancient authorities, in 1831. It was accompanied by no preface, and in 
the explanatory note at the end, he so mentioned oriental authorities, 
as if he had used the term in a sense in which others had previously 
adopted it. As he only developed his principles in G-erman, a language 
of which I then knew nothing, and as his text was unaccompanied by 
the authorities on which it rested, it is not surprising that it was some 
years before I understood his general plan. 

Meanwhile, I was led to adopt critical principles in some respects 
very similar. I say this, not as claiming any merit on the ground of 
originality, but rather, as it may be satisfactory to some, to find that 
the same (or nearly the same) end has been reached through different 
paths of study. After the publication of Scholz's first volume, I gave 
it a pretty careful examination, and I soon saw, even with the incor- 

* Few, in themselves, but still more numerous, as well as more ancient, than 
the MSS. of other works of antiquity. 

t It is worthy of observation, how early this principle was admitted, with 
regard to the Septuagint Greek version of the Old Testament. This book was 
first printed from the later MSS., but from the time that Pope Sixtus V. caused 
it to be published, in 1586, mostly following the text of the Vatican MS., this 
Roman edition was tacitly admitted as the received text, and thus this Greek 
version has, from that time, been read in a text of the fourth century, while, as 
to the Greek Testament, we have followed the readings of ike fifteenth. 



106 APPENDIX. 

rectness and omissions as to the authorities, that the ancient MSS. 
were in general a line of witnesses against his text. I went all through 
St. Matthew's Gospel, writing in the margin of a Greek Testament 
those well-supported readings which Scholz repudiated. This was of 
course wholly for my own use ; but I saw that, as a general principle, 
the modern MSS. have no authority apart from ancient evidence, and 
that it is the ancient MSS. alone which show within what limits we 
have to look a3 to the real ancient text. A few years after (in 1838), I 
drew up a plan and specimen, the execution of which was the object 
which I kept before me, though possessed of but little leisure for the 
purpose. 

In 1844, 1 published the book of Eevelation in Greek and English ; 
in this there was a Greek text, conformed as far as then appeared 
practicable to the ancient copies ; the English translation of this 
volume has since been published separately, so closely following ancient 
authorities, that not one word rests on the modern MSS. This trans- 
lation will show a mere English reader how far sound criticism will 
affect the sense of Scripture, and how far the text of the Greek Testa- 
ment, which I hope to publish, will differ from that which is commonly 
used in this country. 

I need not here go into minute details to show wherein I differ from 
Lachmann, Tischendorf, or others, as to the application of ancient 
materials, — it may suffice to say, that I rest exclusively on the autho- 
rity of ancient MSS. and versions, using the important aid of early 
citations. 

Most of the ancient MSS. I have found it needful to re-collate ; this, 
together with the arrangement of the collected materials, has engaged 
me for years. 

A list of the ancient Greek MSS. of the New Testament will give 
ample proof how the sacred writings have come down to us through 
this mode of transmission. In mentioning these MSS., I will divide 
them into two classes ; 1st. The more ancient, written from the fourth 
to the seventh centuries ; and, 2nd. Those of the three next centuries. 
Some of these MSS. are but fragments, but that does not render them 
the less important as witnesses to the transmission of the books, nor, 
in the parts which they contain, are they the less valuable in their evi- 
dence to the text. 



APPENDIX. 107 

The more ancient MSS., containing the Gospels, are — 

The Codex Vaticamis, B,* at Borne. 

The Codex Ephraemi, C, at Paris. 

The Codex Alexandrinus, A, in the British Museum. 

The Codex Bezse, D, at Cambridge. 

Fragments of St. Matthew's Grospel, Z, at Dublin. 

Fragments P and Q at "Wolfenbiittel. 

Fragments I, IN", and T in the British Museum, Vienna, and Borne. 

Fragments of St. John's Gospel, T, in the Propaganda at Borne. 

Other ancient MSS., containing the Gospels, are— 

E at Basle, F at Utrecht, G- in the British Museum, H at Ham- 
burg, K, L, and M at Paris, S in the Vatican, TJ at Venice, V at 
Moscow, X at Munich, A at St. Grallen ; also the fragments O, B, W, 
Y,-6, and A. 

The more ancient, which contain the Acts, are — 
A, B, C, and D, mentioned before. 
The Codex Laudianus, E, at Oxford. 

The other ancient MSS., containing this book, are— 
The Codex Passionei, G-, in the Augustine Monastery, at Borne. 
H at Modena, and the ancient fragments F at Paris. 
Of these MSS. A, B, and C contain also the Catholic Epistles, which 
are also in K, a Moscow MS. 

The more ancient MSS. of St. Paul's Epistles, are— 

A, B, and C, as before. 

The Codex Claromontanus, D, at Paris. 

Fragments H at Paris. 

Also, of a later date, F at Cambridge, and G at Dresden ; E, a copy 
of D, at St. Petersburg, J at Borne (the MS. marked G in the Acts), 
and K at Moscow. 

In the book of Bevelation there are but three ancient MSS., — A and 

* Soman letters are used to designate the different MSS., simply for con- 
venience of reference ; their order bears no reference to the goodness or import- 
ance of the MSS. themselves. The same letter is sometimes used in different 
parts of the ISTew Testament to designate different MSS. 



108 APPENDIX. 

C, mentioned before, and the Codex Basilianus, B, now in the Vatican 
at Bonie.* 

These, then, together with the ancient versions, are the documents 
which (especially those of the more ancient class) afford an answer to 
any who raise objections on the ground of various readings, as if the 
transmission of the text of the New Testament were really uncertain. 



No. II. 

SOME OF THE RESULTS OF THE GENUINENESS 
OF THE NEW TESTAMENT. 

Theee are certain consequences resulting from the proved authorship 
of the books of the New Testament, which may be briefly indicated. 
They may be regarded as plain corollaries to the points already demon- 
strated. 

* Of these MSS., the test has been published of A, C, D (of the Gospels and 
Acts), the fragments I, N, r, P, Q, T, Z, 0, A, and the MSS. L, A :— of E and 
the fragments F of the Acts : — of G of St. Paul's Epistles, and the fragments H : 
— and of B of the Apocalypse : — the readings of F of the Gospels, and of one 
or two fragments, have also been published; — these, therefore, I have been 
able to collate in the printed editions ; all the others I have collated (at Paris, 
Eome, London, Basle, Munich, Modena, Venice, Cambridge, and Hamburg), 
except the three MSS. in Kussia (the readings of which I take from others) ; S 
in the Vatican, and B, the Codex Vaticanus, the most ancient and important of 
all, from the use of which, alas ! critics are excluded : all that I can do as to 
this MS. is to use the three imperfect collations as far as they go, unless, in- 
deed, Cardinal Mai's edition of this MS., printed, but long withheld from the 
public, should be published in time. 

Besides these ancient MSS., I collated one at Paris (33), containing all the 
Hew Testament, except the Apocalypse ; and the Gospels in one at Basle (1) . 
These, though more modern, are important witnesses to the most ancient text. 
As to all the MSS., I have uniformly compared the collations made by others, as 
well as exaniining for myself. 



APPENDIX. 109 

Since, then, we possess in the New Testament genuine historic monu- 
ments of contemporary writers, who were perfectly competent to bear 
testimony to the facts of which they were cognisant, we must give 
their evidence its full weight as assuring us of the truth of those facts. 
And, further, as the books of the New Testament were not, when writ- 
ten, laid up in secret, but were from the first widely circulated amongst 
a body of persons, who were themselves possessed of a competent 
knowledge of the facts, it is plain that this body of persons, the Chris- 
tian community of the first century, consisting of believing Jews and 
believing G-entiles, are corroborative witnesses to the truth of the his- 
toric monuments. 

We possess, therefore, every conceivable ground of certainty in re- 
gard to the New Testament as giving to us a narrative of real historical 
occurrences, presented to us by a body of such witnesses, that if we 
reject their evidence, we must also say that all testimony is unworthy 
of credit. These witnesses, moreover, so lived and acted, and (in many 
cases) so laid down their lives, as to give, if needful, a yet further con- 
firmation of their testimony. 

It follows, therefore, that Christianity, as based on the facts of the 
incarnation, death, and resurrection of the Son of Grod — whatever be 
its doctrines or its duties — must be true. Its truth is a proved his- 
torical fact. 

We must bear in mind that the nature of the fact proved makes no 
difference whatever ; it may be a thing wholly void of importance, or it 
may involve considerations of the most solemn moment. If the his- 
toric proof be sufficient, no after-considerations can be admitted to 
counterbalance such proof. The case before us is not merely one of 
historic probability, but one of demonstrated reality ; we need not, 
then, raise a question as to any balance of probabilities, as must be 
done in many cases. 

We have no occasion, therefore, to consider the antecedent pro- 
bability, or the contrary, of the facts to which the New Testament 
bears testimony : no such considerations can affect the force of the 
absolute evidence which we possess. How continually do we find that 
we are obliged to admit the reality of facts which, in themselves, seem 
most improbable! We know the origin of the Book of Mormon, — 
how it was originally written by Solomon Spanieling, as a kind of 



110 APPENDIX. 

romance; we know how Joseph Smith and Sidney Eigdon interpolated 
it, and then gave it forth as a divine Eevelation ; we find, besides, in 
the book itself the most contemptible absurdities ; so that on the ante- 
cedent mode of argumentation, we should, of course, conclude, that the 
Book of Mormon was regarded by all as simply the production of 
Spaulding's idle hours, and that Joseph Smith and Sidney Eigdon 
were universally looked on as impostors so low as not even to possess 
the talent of invention. Therefore, it might be concluded that Mor- 
monism, as a system, could not exist, — that it does not exist, — and 
all who maintain that there are or ever have been such a body of per- 
sons, are assuming a ground wholly untenable. And yet, look at what 
occurred in the states of Missouri and Illinois ; look at what now 
exists in the Utah territory ; or, let attention be paid to the labours 
of Mormonite missionaries in this very town. We have proof suffi 
cient that we must admit facts on evidence, irrespective of our antece- 
dent thoughts. 

Difficulties are not unfrequently raised by objectors on the ground 
of supposed discrepancies or contradictions of the New Testament 
writers. "We may, however, inquire whether the alleged discrepancies 
are such as would invalidate the historic authority of other writers ; if 
not, then they must be allowed no more weight when they are objected 
against Apostles and Evangelists. But, again, are the discrepancies 
real or only seeming ? Are they such as admit of no explanation or 
reconciliation ? Perhaps we may not perceive the true mode of ex- 
planation, but can we be sure that none is possible ? Unless we must 
give an unfavourable answer to these inquiries, we may safely dismiss 
them as not being of such a character as ought to trouble us in the 
least. But, further, we may ask objectors, Were those, to whom the 
New Testament writings were first addressed, wholly destitute of dis- 
crimination ? Were they, when they received the Gospels, and added 
them one to another, so as to form our collection, incapable of per- 
ceiving the difficulties which some would regard as so formidable ? Is 
it not certain that those who were best acquainted with the facts, held 
and transmitted our four Gospels as the histories of those facts? 
Who, then, can say that they, having done this in spite of any supposed 
difficulties, are not in a manner the guarantees to us that none of the 
alleged difficulties are really inexplicable ? 



APPENDIX. Ill 

Perhaps no historical difficulty, connected with the Gospels, has 
been so much relied on as that relating to the taxing, in Luke ii., " And 
it came to pass in those days, that there went out a decree from Csesar 
Augustus, that all the world should be taxed. And this taxing was 
first made when Cyrenius was governor of Syria." This "taxing," 
then, is said by St. Luke to be anterior to the birth of Christ, and yet 
Cyrenius was not governor of Syria till about twelve years later. 
"What a contradiction!" an objector might say. But let us apply to 
this difficulty the circumstances of historic transmission, and then let 
us see whether they do not rebut the force of the difficulty. We have 
seen that we have good grounds of evidence for acquiescing in the com- 
mon belief, which assigns the authorship of our third Gospel, and the 
Acts of the Apostles, to Luke, the companion of St. Paul. The Gos- 
pel was, therefore, written about sixty years after the events which are 
described in the opening chapters. The " taxing" was an event pecu- 
liarly well known to all the Jews, as it was the incident which affixed 
the actual mark of subjection to Rome on them as a nation, and which 
sealed the transfer of Judaea to those Western rulers. Now, it was im- 
possible for those at large, for whom Luke wrote, not to be acquainted 
with these things ; and, therefore, their reception of this Gospel, as an 
authentic history, is a proof that they did not see anything insur- 
mountable in what the Evangelist had stated. If any one were now 
to write about the events of the French revolution, 1789 — 93, he might 
so take for granted that his readers knew the leading events, that he 
would not be afraid of having his meaning misconceived, even though 
his words were capable of a construction opposed to open and notori- 
ous facts : if any one were to object either to the veracity or accuracy 
of such a writer, who is there that would not see that the objection 
was utterly futile ? The public notoriety of leading facts must often 
be our guide in understanding what is written about them. We must 
not look merely from the present day at ancient writings and events, 
but we must make our point of view the actual time when we prove 
that the books, which we examine, were written, and from that we 
must look at the events described. We must then inquire whether 
what we suppose to be discrepancies were really such to the first 
readers, and whether their having transmitted the books as authentic, 
in spite of such difficulties, does not in itself remove the greater part of 
their alleged force, and whether the difficulties do not afford some 



112 APPENDIX. 

proof of the truth, honesty, and absence of all imposition in the whole 
matter.* 

"We need not undervalue the pains which have been taken to discuss 
each particular difficulty, and to show that each is really groundless : 
but in doing this we must not forget the antecedent vantage-ground 
which we possess in the evidence of historic transmission ; this meets 
many a difficulty; this enables us to say (whether we can explain the 
objection or not), the contemporaries of the writer received the record 
such as it is, and they have thus transmitted it as authentic to us ; they 
had all the facts before them, and they are authorities to us that the 
difficulties are no impeachment to the authenticity. Thus will evidence 
of historic transmission from them remove objections even before ex- 
plaining them. 

But from the proved historical fact of Christianity, as recorded in 
the New Testament, other consequences result. Christianity must be 
a revelation from God, authoritatively confirmed to us by Him. The 
whole of the miraculous impress which the New Testament history 
bears is a proof of this ; — a proof which can only be avoided by denying 
that the events took place : that is, by denying that the New Testa- 
ment presents to us historic realities. If the according testimony of 
competent witnesses be not a sufficient proof of the reality of the New 

* The solution of the difficulty in Luke ii., appears to be found in two things ; 
the force of the word rendered " taxing," and the full import of " was made"; 
— " this taxing was first made." The word " taxing" is quite as extensive in its 
import as our term assessment ; we may say that an assessment has been made, 
as soon as it is determined how much must be paid by each individual ; but the 
thing is not complete until the sum assessed has actually been paid. Just so the 
taxing, or rather enrolment. The expression "was made" seems to be equiva- 
lent to "was carried into effect," or "was finished" (as in Heb. iv. 3). " This 
enrolment was first carried out when Cyrenius was governor of Syria." It is in 
vain to say that this rendering would not have been thought of except to avoid 
a difficulty. We know that St. Luke was perfectly aware of the facts ; we know, 
therefore, that be could not have intended to say that Cyrenius had been gover- 
nor of Syria prior to our Lord's birth : he could not, therefore, have used these 
words unless they admitted tridy of a different sense. "When words are capable 
of divers senses, that must be taken which we know to be the writer's meaning. 
Who imagines that St. John (vii. 39) teaches the non-existence of the Holy 
Ghost prior to the glorification of Christ ? If any one were now to write that 
"the French revolution was completed in the empire of Napoleon," who would 
charge him with confounding 1789 and 1804, or with representing Buonaparte 
as an actor in the scenes of the former period ? 



APPENDIX. 113 

Testament miracles, then is no conceivable degree of evidence sufficient 
to persuade men that God has thus confirmed a revelation of His will, 
intended to teach the way of forgiveness and salvation. 

But the character of the facts does not really affect the evidence ; if 
it be good in so far as it testifies that Jesus Christ was crucified, it is 
equally good in its attestation that He rose from the dead : if it be good 
in its testimony that Jesus was a teacher, then it is just as valid in 
declaring that, in proof of his mission, he did such works as no other 
man did. And further, the living multitude of Christians, when the 
New Testament books were written, were themselves witnesses to the 
signs and wonders wrought by the Apostles, in the name of Jesus 
Christ of Nazareth. 

Thus then did the writers of the New Testament claim the place of 
authoritative teachers of the revelation which God had given, and thus 
fully did they substantiate that claim. The New Testament professes 
an authority, that though written by men, yet that it contains not the 
mere words of men, but the words of God Himself. The Apostles claim 
nothing short of this : the promises of Christ to this effect are recorded 
in the Gospels, and in all their authoritative teaching they show that 
they claimed inspiration. This may be briefly described as being such 
an operation of the Holy Ghost on them, that they wrote not as mere 
men, but as those whom He qualified and endowed for the writing of 
Scripture ; so that, without their individuality having been at all de- 
stroyed, they wrote those things which God saw fit that they should 
write, and in such a way as He was pleased to appoint. 

Inspiration may or may not be accompanied with a communication 
of new truth : in the former case there would be r.evelation ; but in- 
spiration is as much needed to write authoritatively known facts as it 
is to communicate new truth ; else why should such and such facts be 
selected, and others be passed by ? To record precepts and doctrines 
authoritatively r , inspiration was as necessary as it was to declare things 
before unknown to man: and this inspiration the New Testament 
writers claim ; this inspiration was confirmed by the miracles which 
they wrotight ; this inspiration was promised by our Lord when He 
unfolded to his Apostles the relation in which the Holy Ghost should 
stand to them ; and this inspiration was owned by contemporaries as 
attaching to our New Testament books, inasmuch as they received 
them, making as they do such exalted claims. 



1 14 APPENDIX. 

One important consequence, flowing from the proved authorship of 
the New Testament books, bears directly upon the authority of the 
Old Testament. Our Lord and his Apostles constantly refer to that 
collection of Hebrew Scriptures as being authoritative. They appeal 
to them as being so fully from God, that their statements could in no 
way be set aside. " The Scripture cannot be broken," was the declara- 
tion of the Lord Jesus Christ, with which he met the opposition of the 
Jews. " The Law, the Prophets, and the Psalms," were alike brought 
forward as direct declarations of the truth of God, through his ancient 
servants. "The Holy Ghost saith" introduces a passage from a 
Psalm. Thus, if the authority of the Old Testament be impugned 
by any, it is incumbent on them first to disprove the revelation which 
G-od has given in the New. If the books of the New Testament are 
indeed genuine, they contain a revelation from God confirmed by 
miracles, especially that crowning miracle of the resurrection of Christ, 
— a fact which was bebeved on testimony, and which raised up in the 
world the body of men called Christians : but if the New Testament 
be a revelation from God, then it confirms the Old, and sanctions as 
divine those very books which the Jews then held, and still hold fast, 
as having been written by inspiration. The sanction given by Christ 
and his Apostles to particular books is a sanction to the collection as 
such; it is, however, interesting to see that particular books, which 
some have opposed, are distinctly mentioned in the New Testament as 
possessed of full authority. Thus, some have chosen to deny that the 
book of Daniel was really the production of a prophet in Babylon, in 
the days of Nebuchadnezzar and his successors, and they have assumed 
that the book must have been written in or after the days of the Mac- 
cabees. But all this theory is at once set aside by our Lord's declara- 
tion, "When ye see the abomination of desolation, spoken of by 
Daniel the prophet (let him that readeth understand)." So too as to 
the Pentateuch, which some have chosen to assert was a work of an 
age long posterior to that of Moses ; but our Lord says of Moses, " He 
wrote of me." 

It is when the testimony of Christ and his Apostles to the Hebrew 
Scriptures is borne in mind, that we are able fully to understand the 
extent of their confirmed declarations of the inspiration of Scripture. 
They teach the inspiration of the Old Testament in the highest sense ; 
they claim no less authority for the writings of the New. " All Scrip- 



APPENDIX. 115 

ture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for 
reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, that the man 
of God may be perfect, throughly furnished unto all good works." 

Thus, we have direct teaching as to the authoritative inspiration of 
Scripture, and also as to its sufficiency. ~No communication of facts, 
doctrines, or precepts can pertain to the thorough furnishing of the 
man of Grod which is not found in the treasury of Holy Scripture, or 
which may not be clearly exhibited therefrom. 

These considerations as to the authority and sufficiency of Scripture 
are deeply important at the present day, when so many efforts are 
made, clad in a garb of seeming wisdom, so-called spiritualism* and 
profound philosophy, to set aside one or the other of these vital truths. 

There are those who stigmatise a right and reverential regard for the 
authority of Holy Scripture as " Bibliolatry ";f and then we are told by 



* The use of terms is often strange : " spiritualism" is now used to signify an 
-ism from which all Christianity has been spirited away. 

t Perhaps the word " Bibliolatry" would not pass current if it were remem- 
bered that it seems to have originated with Lessing, the publisher of the once 
celebrated " Wolfenbiittel Fragments." Lessing held the post of Ducal 
Librarian at Wolfenbiittel, and he published at Brunswick, between 1773 and 
1781, a periodical, entitled, " Contributions to History and Literature, out of the 
Treasures of the Ducal Library at Wolfenbiittel" (Beitrage zur Geschichte und 
Literatur, aus den Seh'atzen der Herzoglichen Bibliothek zu Wolfenbiittel) . 
In the fourth volume (principally) of this work (1777), he gave, as if from a MS. 
found in the Wolfenbiittel library, fragments of an anonymous writer, the 
object of which was to represent the Evangelists as wilful and intentional 
deceivers. In these "fragments" almost every sceptical objection might be 
found gathered together, and thus they have formed an arsenal for later 
opposers. Lessing, in publishing the fragments, professed that the objections 
were inconclusive, etc., but this was a mere piece of policy, as was his statement 
that he published them to show his impartiality. It has since been ascertained 
that, so far from the fragments having been the production of an unknown 
writer of an earlier age, they were written by Beimarus, at Hamburg ; and so 
far from their having been deposited (as some supposed) in the library of Wolf- 
enbiittel, to be found by Lessing, Dr. Schonemann, the librarian at that place 
in 1850, informed me that Beimarus sent them from Hamburg to his friend 
Lessing, and that thus they never had any actual connection with the library at 
all. Such were the deceptions connected with this attack on the Bible. Wri- 
ters, like Lessing and Beimarus, who sought in underhand ways to destroy the 
authority of Scripture, might fitly term any respect for the word of God " Bib- 
liolatry" j but let none use such a word as this, unless they wish to be identified 
with those who desire secretly to undermine all Christian belief, and dishonestly 
to introduce a mere negative deism. 



116 APPENDIX. 

such that their faith requires living realities, and not dead histories. 
But what is meant by " living realities," as opposed to " dead histories" ? 
It almost reminds one of the contrast drawn by Festus, when he spoke 
of " one Jesus that was dead, whom Paul affirmed to be alive." Our 
object of faith is not a mere history ; but it is that Person of whom that 
history teaches. What do we know of any Christ, unless we receive 
the Scripture testimony to Him who laid down his life as a sacrifice, 
and rose again ? The Scripture, even though it may be termed " a dead 
history" by scorn or ignorance, is that which authoritatively teaches 
us living realities : it presents to us the living person of Jesus, the Son 
of God, as the object of faith ; it points us to Him as the Saviour of all 
that come unto God by Him. It is in vain for " spiritualism" (as it is 
called) to ask for something more "refined" than this; the cross of 
Jesus Christ is still the real offence, as it was of old, and thus it is that 
all that relates to a crucified Saviour is depreciated as a dead history. 
Oh ! that " spiritualists " would be content to learn from Grod, instead 
of forming their own thoughts as to what religion ought to be ! 

There are some who, without professing to object to the doctrines of 
Christianity as commonly held, speak in a lax and derogatory manner 
of Scripture. They represent it as though it were true and useful, but 
still not of paramount importance. Amongst these, such expressions 
may be heard as " a dead letter " applied to the Scripture ; and this is 
contrasted with the living Spirit, by whom souls must be vivified. 
Now, while it is quite true that He who potentially applieth the 
truth of Scripture to our souls is the living Spirit of the Most High 
God, yet it was that same Spirit who Himself gave forth the Scripture, 
and who has embodied therein the whole compass of that truth which 
infinite wisdom has seen fit to reveal. Why should we be told of " a 
dead letter" ? The hearts of men may be unable to receive and use the 
truths of Scripture, but this is no reason for depreciating the Scripture 
itself; it is the heart, the feelings and the spiritual affections of the 
reader that are dead, and not that record of God's truth, which testifies 
how life and healing are imparted to the dead and sin-stricken soul. 

Sentiments sometimes appear to assume a form which has been em- 
bodied (perhaps with the desire of giving defmiteness to the opinions 
of others) in the sentence, " If every Bible were destroyed to-day, there 



APPENDIX. 117 

would still be as much vital piety in the world to-morrow." If this 
thought has in this form actually passed through any mind, it can only 
arise from great inconsiderateness, or from great misapprehension, — 
misapprehension both as to what the authority of the Bible is, and as 
to the meaning of vital piety. If any one were to say, " If all the food 
in the world were to be destroyed to-day, there would be as many per- 
sons as before alive to-morrow morning," it would be felt to be an 
assertion true in itself, but still utterly meaningless as an argument 
that we are not sustained by food. God, if he pleases, can maintain 
natural life without natural sustenance, and so He can keep his people 
in spiritual well-being without Scripture; but still the constituted 
relations of things, in the spheres of what is natural and what is spiri- 
tual, are not at all disproved. If it would be an act of madness to cast 
away food because God, the Omnipotent, can sustain our life without 
it, must it not be a proof of yet deeper blindness if we despise holy 
Scripture, from which cometh our spiritual sustainment ? If God sent 
Elijah forty days' journey into the wilderness, where there was no food, 
He miraculously upheld him ; so if God places any of his people where 
they are deprived of Scripture (whether as read or heard, it matters 
not), He can supply the need. If every Bible in this land were de- 
stroyed this day, what would the spiritual condition of England soon 
be ? Would vital Godliness increase or decline ? Let the condition of 
countries deprived of the Scriptures, or let the condition of England 
before the Reformation, supply an answer. Instead of thus speculating, 
let us be humbly thankful that God, in his good providence, permits us 
the free use of his holy Word, and let us desire and pray that its true 
and living power may be the more known. 

A right apprehension of the evidence which authenticates the New 
Testament books, and which shows the plenary character of that reve- 
lation which they contain, would do much to hinder the reception of 
the lax sentiments to which reference has been made. Indeed, it is not 
a little remarkable, how sensitive on the subject do those show them- 
selves to be who seek to depreciate Scripture : they habitually represent 
Christian evidence as unsatisfactory and inconclusive. They make some 
spiritualised notion of what is true and divine, which they hold in 
their own minds, the ultimate standard. But is Christian evidence 
unsatisfactory ? It may be so to those who have never rightly directed 
their attention to it, and who feel that to them it would be most un- 



118 APPENDIX. 

satisfactory to receive objective truths bearing on their conscience, and 
humbling them in the dust before God as sinners condemned and lost, 
instead of their being allowed to speculate freely on questions of re- 
ligion, as though they were known intuitively. Is Christian evidence 
inconclusive ? If it be, then must all other evidence be inconclusive 
likewise : he who is ignorant of any science may pronounce all proofs 
connected with it to be inconclusive, because he possesses no com- 
petency of mind to apprehend their force ; and just so as to Christian 
evidence, it can only be inconclusive to him who understands it not. 
It is worthy of note, that the very persons who complain of the incon- 
clusiveness and unsatisfactoriness of historic proof, are themselves by 
no means void of confidence in the certainty of the thoughts which they 
maintain from their own feelings, without any proof at all. 

Partial views of truth and of Christian doctrine sometimes tend, in 
their results, to the rejection of some part of Scripture, and to laxity 
with regard to all. In opposition to this it may be said, that a firm 
grasp of the authority of Scripture, on grounds of historic evidence, 
may be an important means of hindering partial views of Christian 
truth. 

Partial views of truth sometimes show themselves in the importance 
attached to the New Testament system of ethics, forgetful that doctrine 
is there always the basis of instruction ; so that it is impossible to own 
Christ as an authoritative teacher, without acknowledging Him as a 
Divine Redeemer. 

It is in vain for any to speak of " Christianity" as " a system of 
morals, destined to renovate human nature by its elevating influence"; 
it is not intended to enable man to raise himself to the presence of God 
by his own powers ; it does not regenerate man by teaching him morally 
to reform himself, but its basis is redemption, — a work performed by 
the Son of God according to the appointment of the Father ; a deliver- 
ance wrought for us, and not any mere influence brought to act on us. 
It is in vain to speak of Christian principles moulding the hearts and 
feelings of any, unless they first of all are brought to rest upon the 
sacrifice of Christ, for them, as that alone by which guilty man can be 
accepted by God the holy and just. 

The results flowing from partial views of Christian truth may be easily 



APPENDIX. 119 

illustrated. Some have regarded the revelation of God in the New Testa- 
ment as wholly a declaration of love; — so much so as to deny that there 
is properly on G-od's part actual wrath now against sinners. " G-od so 
loved the world, that He gave his only-begotten Son," is the one truth 
which they would press, forgetful that the same chapter in which this 
is written contains also, " He that believeth not the Son shall not see life, 
but the ivrath of G-od abidetli on him.'" If there be no anger, properly 
speaking, on God's part against sin, all doctrinal statements which 
represent this as the fact are looked on, of course, as antiquated delu- 
sions. Thus, the second article of the Church of England, that Christ 
" truly suffered, was crucified, dead and buried, to reconcile his Father 
to us," is set aside as superfluous and incorrect. They say that man 
needed to be reconciled to God, not God to man ; and thus, instead of 
seeing the perfect truth of the doctrine of the article (though God 
might have been more precise than " his Father," as it is here no ques- 
tion of personality) , one part of God's revelation as to reconciliation is 
set aside. It is quite true that the Scripture teaches that man's heart 
is enmity against God ; and if there be reconciliation, the enmity must 
first be removed ; but it is equally true that a real sacrifice of pro- 
pitiation must be made, in order that God's wrath may not fall upon 
the sinner. But if reconciliation be looked on as only on the part of 
man, what becomes of the reality of a sacrifice for sin in the death of 
Christ ? And this is, in fact, the turning point of the whole matter as 
to God's revelation. Was the death of Christ a proper sacrifice or not ? 
The Scripture leaves us in no doubt. He died as bearing the weight of 
our sins ; He received the wrath (real and actual wrath) from the hand 
of God, as our substitute and surety ; and it is on Him that his be- 
lieving people confide, knowing that as He is God, so all that He did 
has an infinite value, and as He is also man, He was capable of dying 
in the stead of men. 

The moment that any deny that it was needful for God to be recon- 
ciled to man, the reality of the sacrificial character of Christ's death is 
affected, and thus all that relates to his having given Himself for us 
becomes somewhat metaphorical. 

Results soon follow : the propitiatory sacrifice of Christ is let go ; for 
if there be not real anger on God's part, why could it be needed ? The 
reality of his Godhead and incarnation are then loosely held, and He is 
regarded either as divine only in some sense, or else as a mere man. 



120 APPENDIX. 

Forthwith the Scripture is set aside : all that describes Him as God 
over all, blessed for ever, is rejected, either by the denial of its authority, 
or else by such a perversion of words as would be inadmissible on any 
other subject. 

But besides this laxity of mind as to all Scripture, another definite 
result has followed. It has been felt that if atonement and sacrifice are 
not Christian ideas, then the Law of Moses could be no revelation from 
G-od, and therefore it has been distinctly denied to be such. This de- 
nial is indeed an unconscious testimony to the actual unity of mind 
which pervades Revelation. 

What is this but taking from our hands both chart and compass, and 
leaving us to float as winds and waves may guide ? 

In another country the result mentioned has been reached through 
the steps described : may all such conclusions be a warning to us, and 
may we learn so to hold fast intelligently the authority of Scripture, as 
to reject with enlightened consciousness whatever theories would lead 
to such results ! 

On the one hand, we see how Eome-ward tendencies are at work, 
leading minds into subjection to mere authority which is not of God ; — 
on the other hand, we see opposing tendencies to cast off the acknow- 
ledgment of all actual authority, — of all objective certainty in religion. 
Historic evidence presents us a ground on which our feet may rest 
firmly, rejecting alike subjection of mind to papal claims, irrespective of 
individual conscience before G-od, and the rationalistic, Straussian 
system, which leaves but a religion of negations. 

Let the authority of God in his word be upheld ; let the grounds of 
this be intelligently stated, and then it may be a safeguard against both 
these forms of error ; and thus many may continue to prove, through 
the mercy of G-od, that holy Scripture is able to make wise unto sal- 
vation, through faith which is in Christ Jesus. 



IN PREPARATION. 



THE GREEK NEW TESTAMENT, 

EDITED EBOM ANCIENT AIJTHOEITIES, 



VARIOUS READINGS OF ALL THE ANCIENT MSS, 

THE 

ANCIENT VERSIONS, AND EARLIER ECCLESIASTICAL 
WRITERS (TO EUSEBIUS INCLUSIVE), 

TOGETHEB WITH 

THE LATIN VERSION OF JEROME, 
FROM THE CODEX AMIATINUS OF THE SIXTH CENTURY. 

By S. P. TREGELLES, LL.D. 



The object of this proposed Edition may be briefly explained. All ancient 
works bave come down to us with various readings, arising from mistakes of 
transcribers, or from endeavours to correct such mistakes. The Holy Scrip- 
tures, given by Divine inspiration, bave been subject to the same casualties 
in their transmission as other works. Hence it is needful to resort to critical 
authorities, in order to edit the books of Holy Scripture as correctly as 



The earliest printed editions of the Greek New Testament were based on 
but a few MSS. of comparatively recent date ; while in the course of the last 
three centuries, not a few ancient and authoritative MSS. have come to bight. 
Hence it is of deep importance to all those who value the Word of God, that 
the New Testament should be edited from the best and most ancient autho- 
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any liberty with the sacred text thus to recur to the ancient copies ; it is, on 
the contrary, treating it with that veneration which those should show, who 
desire to use it as nearly as possible in the words in which the Holy Ghost 
gave it forth. 

"With this object, the Editor has been for many years engaged in the colla- 
tion of MSS., etc., in order that he may give the authorities of the text as 
accurately as possible. This has involved the necessity of examining the 
MSS. themselves, in Italy, France, Switzerland, and Germany, as well as in 
Engbsh libraries ; he has thus been able to collate for himself most of the 
ancient documents. 



In preparing the text, he makes ancient evidence the ground on which 
every word rests ; and the authorities are so stated, that it may be at once 
seen what witnesses uphold, and what oppose each reading. 

The whole of the materials are now in a state of considerable preparation ; 
and in hope that the whole will soon be ready for the press, the Editor wishes 
to give all publicity to this labour in which he is engaged in connection with 
the Text of God's Holy Word, since the publication of such an undertaking 
must necessarily depend on his obtaining a sufficient number of subscribers. 

To be published in One Volume, 4to., Price ^3 3s. 

Specimen pages have been prepared, and may be obtained on application to 
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REMARKS ON THE PEOPHETIC VISIONS 
IN THE BOOK OF DANIEL. 

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VI. The uniformity of the paper throughout allows of the greatest attainable 
flexibility in the binding. 

VII. The Blank- Page Bible is the Authorised Version, printed with the 
largest possible type, and enriched with original References, Tables, 
Maps, and a Blank-paged Index of Subjects. Kept bound up with 
Cruden's Concordance, Apocrypha, etc. 

In cloth lettered, price 25s. In " Bagster's flexible Turkey binding," 35s. plain. 

Cruden's Concordance to the above, 4s. extra. 

The Book of Common Prayer and New Version of Psalms, 3s. extra. 

The Psalms of the Church of Scotland, Is. extra. 



THE MINIATUEE QUAETO BIBLE. 

* The characteristics of this Bible are handiness and legibility ; it is printed in 
the largest Small Pica type, with critical and philological Notes, references to 
parallel passages, etc., etc., in a single one-handed beautiful volume, on the 
finest toned paper, and constitutes one of the most beautiful editions of the Scrip- 
tures ever prepared. 

Its size is 9| inches by 7, and 2| inches thick. 
With coloured maps, etc., bound in best plain morocco, price 30s. Qd. Kept in 
every variety of plain, flexible, and sumptuous binding, with mountings, etc. 



THE CHKONOLOGICAL BIBLE ATLAS 

Is a complete collection of Maps fully coloured, with copious Geographical ex- 
planatory matter ; and an Engraved Chart of the World's History, which ex- 
hibits the progress of Sacred and Profane Events from the Creation of the 
World to the Third Century of the Christian Era. Indexes, etc., etc. 
Small quarto, bound in half morocco, price 10s. 6cZ.. 



WYLD'S SCEIPTUBE ATLAS 

Is an extensive series of Maps, in which the position of every locality and event 

is defined. The Maps are on a large scale, to allow room for this detail. 

Small quarto, half bound, price 10s. 6d._ 



THE POCKET BIBLE ATLAS, 

Containing fourteen Coloured Maps, and a Chronological Chart of Comparative 
History. Foolscap octavo, half bound, price 4s. 



A PEACTICAL GUIDE TO THE GREEK NEW 
TESTAMENT ; 

Designed for the use of those who have no knowledge of the Greek Language, 

but who desire to read the New Testament in the original. 

Foolscap octavo, price 3s. 6d. 

The work is intended to facilitate the study of the Greek New Testament ; — to 

furnish the Student with all the assistance which can be afforded, and to lead 

him on in an accurate acquaintance with the words and phrases of the Greek 

Testament. 

A POCKET LEXICON, GREEK AND ENGLISH, 

To the New Testament. 
By the Rev. T. S. Green, M. A. 
Foolscap octavo and l6mo., and post octavo, price 4s. 6d. 
In this work, the classification of words being an important point, and one to 
which in modern works it is expected that attention should be paid, words are so 
designated as to mark those which belong to the New Testament only, or to that 
and the Septuagint, or to the later Greek (i. e. from Polybius inclusive). In con- 
nection with the classification of words, we may mention classification of meanings ; 
to this attention has likewise been paid, so as to distinguish such meanings as are 
peculiar to the New Testament, etc., etc. 



In preparation, uniform with the Large-Print Greek Testament, 

A GREEK AND ENGLISH LEXICON 

To the Septuagint, and to the New Testament. 
By the Rev. T. S. Green, M. A. 



THE INTERLINEARY HEBREW AND ENGLISH 
PSALTER ; 

In which the construction of every Hebrew word is indicated, and the Root of 

each distinguished by the use of hollow and other types. 
Foolscap octavo, price 6s. With a Hebrew and English Lexicon, 12s. Also in 

limp morocco for the pocket, 9s. Ditto, 16s. 

*** The Pocket Hebrew and English Lexicon, when bound with this edition of 

the Psalms, includes a great deal of what the Hebraist 

needs in a very compact form. 



GESENIUS'S HEBREW AND CHALDEE 
LEXICON : 

By Dr. Tregelles ; with numerous Additions and Corrections from the Author's 
latest works, and other sources; with an English-Hebrew Index. Third Edition. 

This Lexicon is not unsuited to the beginner, but is at the same time sufficient 
for the advanced scholar. 

Small 4to. Price, in cloth, 28s. 6d. Also, in strong flexible calf, price 7s. extra. 



THE ANALYTICAL HEBKEW LEXICON ; 

THE WORDS OF THE ENTIRE HEBREW SCRIPTURES ARE ARRANGED JUST AS THEY ARE FOUND 
IN THE SACRED TEXT, ALPHABETICALLY, AND ARE GRAMMATICALLY EXPLAINED. 

The Analytical Lexicon is — 

I. A Lexicon in the ordinary sense of supplying the various meanings of 
the various roots. 
II. A Dictionary of every derivative and modification of every root, in alpha- 
betical order, with analysis. 

III. A storehouse of the anomalies of the language, carefully arranged and 

referred to from all parts of the work. 

IV. A Concordance of the least easily understood words. 

The student of the original has only to turn from his Bible to this Lexicon for 
the solution of every etymological diniculty that may obstruct his progress : he 
will find, without trouble or loss of time, a complete analysis of every word, with 
an account of its peculiarities, and a reference to the conjugation or declension 
to which it may belong, or if it be irregular, to its exceptional class. 

The Grammatical Introduction, is chiefly devoted to the study of the irregu- 
larities of the language. Here will be found, it is believed, every single excep- 
tional word, with a concise explanation of its peculiarities. 

" It is the ultimatum of Hebrew Lexicography, and will leave the Theologian, 
who still remains ignorant of the Sacred tongue, absolutely without excuse." — 
Churchman's Monthly Review. 

One volume quarto, price £1 2s., cloth. Kept bound in calf, flexible back, etc. 



THE ANALYTICAL LEXICON TO THE GKEEK 
NEW TESTAMENT. 

On the same plan as the Hebrew Lexicon above described. 
An Alphabetical arrangement of every word found in the Greek Text, in every 
form in which each appears ; that is to say, every occurrent person, number, tense, 
or mood of verbs, every case and number of nouns, pronouns, etc., is placed in its 
alphabetical order, fully explained by a careful grammatical analysis, and re- 
ferred to its root ; so that no uncertainty as to the grammatical structure of any 
word can perplex the beginner ; but, assured of the precise grammatical force of 
any word he may desire "to interpret, he is able immediately to apply his know- 
ledge of the English meaning of the root with accuracy and satisfaction. 

This Lexicon comprises the following features : — 

.1. A complete collection of all the words, and forms of words, used in the 

New Testament, alphabetically arranged. 
II. A grammatical analysis of every word ; in which the construction of 

each is fully explained, and every irregularity accounted for. 
III. An indication of the root of every form. 

,1V. A Lexicon of meanings, in which the signification is methodically ar- 
ranged according to its principal and secondary uses. The quantity 
of the principal doubtful vowels is marked ; the classes of words dis- 
tinguished, whether occurring first in the later Greek period, or found 
only in the New Testament, or in writings akin to it in style or in- 
fluenced by it; and those which occur also in the Septuagint and 
Apocrypha. 
V. A Conspectus under each root of all the words thence derived. " 
VI. A citation of the occurrence of every word found but once in the New 

Testament. 
VII. Tables of the Verbs, Nouns, Pronouns, etc. ; forming a system of Para- 
digms for reference. 
VIII. Copious elucidations of the Grammar of the Language, in connection 
with the Analysis, and in particular of the exceptional and irregular 
forms. 

One volume, quarto, price 25s.. in cloth. 



THE HOLY VESSELS AND FUENITUEE OF 
THE TABEENACLE OF ISEAEL, 

In large Drawings, on a uniform scale, with metallic illumination of the Gold, 
Silver, Brass, etc. ; the gorgeous Coverings being richly coloured to represent 
the original fabrics ; with full explanatory letter-press. 

The size of this Volume is oblong quarto ; it is done up in half-morocco, with 
gilded side, lettering, etc. Price 35s. 



Just Completed. 

THE BIBLE OF EVEEY LAND. 

A History of all the Versions of the Sacred Scriptures hitherto published, with an 
Account of their Distribution among the Nations of the Earth. 

Illustrated with very numerous Specimens, Coloured Maps, Comparative Alphabets, 
Indexes, etc. etc. 

The "BIBLE OF EVERT LAND" attempts to embrace the operations of 
all Christian men throughout the earth, and to present to its readers a succinct 
account of the present state of Bible distribution and Missionary effort ; hoping. 
thereby, to excite thankfulness to God for what is accomplished, and to stimulate 
to fresh efforts, by the exhibition of the clouds that still darken . every portion of 
the habitable globe. The List of Languages into which the Scriptures have not 
been translated will be found very interesting. 

The size of the Volume is Crown quarto. The Binding is of the best kind, in 
half-morocco, with characteristic designs. The price £1 2s. 

Dedicated by permission to his Grace the Archbishop of Canterbury. 



THE SYKIAC NEW TESTAMENT, 

Foolscap octavo, price 8s. 
The Steiac Testament and Lexicon, in One volume, price 12s. 



A SYKIAC LEXICON, 

Uniform, price 4s. 

THE SYEIAC TESTAMENT AND LEXICON, 

In One volume, price 12s. 



A SYEIAC EEADING BOOK ; 

Consisting of Extracts from the Old and New Testaments, and the Syriac Nar- 
rative of Richard Coeur de Lion's Crusading Adventures, translated and gram- 
matically analysed. In post octavo, price 5s. 



A SYEIAC CONCORDANCE TO THE NEW 

TESTAMENT, 

Somewhat on the principle of Cruden's Concordance, is in preparation. 

SAMUEL BAGSTEE AND SONS, 

15, PATERNOSTER ROW. 

FEB 141949 
















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